New Technology Reviews!.: Reader

Evri Turns The News Into A Colorful & Well Organized Experience [iPad]

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<br />
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
<img alt="evri ipad app" class="aligncenter" data-mce-src="http://www.new-technology-news.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/826eb06418h01_52.jpg.jpg" src="http://www.new-technology-news.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/826eb06418h01_52.jpg.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" />Staying connected, something we all like to do these days, means reading e-mails everywhere, checking Facebook every hour, and also being on top of the latest news. Be it the big things happening in our area, some exciting Hollywood news or the release of a major update to our favorite app, we like to know about things when they happen.</div>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
There are some pretty attractive, fun and personalized ways to read news on your iPad. However, many news apps, even the very best ones, tend to overwhelm me. Many of them are comprised of endless squares that I need to customize in order to not get immediately lost. Evri is a news reader for the iPadwhich makes it all a bit more organized. While not being very customizable, it makes it easy to zoom in directly on your favorite topics and still be able to broaden your interests whenever you feel like it.</div>
<h2 style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
Browsing, Reading & Sharing</h2>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
Evri turns news, no matter what they are, into candy. The app is very well designed, and everything you look at just beckons you to read it. When you first load the app, you’ll see a top bar with some topics you can choose from (News, US & World, Entertainment, Sports, Business and Technology). Tapping any of these will show you a list of hot sub-topics on the left and some hot news on the main screen.</div>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
<img alt="evri ipad app" border="0" class="aligncenter" data-mce-src="http://www.new-technology-news.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/2bc26c8597age195.png.png" height="508" src="http://www.new-technology-news.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/2bc26c8597age195.png.png" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="570" /></div>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
When you focus on one sub-topic, you get a glimpse of the very top news, a list of featured articles and some related topics. For each and every topic you browse, no matter how broad or how specific, there’s a “<em>Follow</em>” button. Tapping it will add the topic to your <em>Now Following</em> list, and you’ll be able to read everything under it easily as it’s published.</div>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
<img alt="evri news search" border="0" class="aligncenter" data-mce-src="http://www.new-technology-news.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/cda36a00abh19_19.jpg.jpg" height="612" src="http://www.new-technology-news.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/cda36a00abh19_19.jpg.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="453" /></div>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
You can easily access your <em>Now Following</em> list from this notice or from the main app page. From there you can also delete topics you are not longer interested in.</div>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
<img alt="evri news search" border="0" class="aligncenter" data-mce-src="http://www.new-technology-news.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/44d5b97801h13_20.jpg.jpg" height="208" src="http://www.new-technology-news.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/44d5b97801h13_20.jpg.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="260" /></div>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
Evri gathers news items from all over the Web. When browsing a topic, you’ll get a preview (or sometimes the full article, if it’s short) of all the hot stories from different sources. There are several things you can do with these:</div>
<ul style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
<li>“<em>Read</em>” opens the full original article in the app’s internal browser.</li>
<li>“<em>Save</em>” lets you save this article for later using Read It Later or Instapaper (requires login).</li>
<li>“<em>Share</em>” allows you to share this piece of news with friends via Facebook & Twitter (requires login) or via e-mail. You can also use this button to open the article in Safari.</li>
</ul>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
<img alt="evri news search" border="0" class="aligncenter" data-mce-src="http://www.new-technology-news.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/e21ac43bc7h13_00.jpg.jpg" height="482" src="http://www.new-technology-news.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/e21ac43bc7h13_00.jpg.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="562" /></div>
<h2 style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
Finding & Learning</h2>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
You might not be very interested in the somewhat limited topics Evri provides for quick browsing. But don’t worry, Evri provides a quick, live search for topics. No matter what page you’re on, tap the search box and start typing. Evri will immediately start loading a list of topics which might be a match for your word. It will not limit by broad topics, so a search for “<em>Horse</em>”, for example, yields the animal, a military person, a plant, a film and so on.</div>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
<img alt="evri news" border="0" class="aligncenter" data-mce-src="http://www.new-technology-news.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/3aaf0386c9h14_01.jpg.jpg" height="481" src="http://www.new-technology-news.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/3aaf0386c9h14_01.jpg.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="475" /></div>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
When you’ve found your specific topic, simply tap on it and you’ll be taken to a page dedicated to everything that has to do with this topic. The connection can be somewhat loose, especially if your topic is a bit broad.</div>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
At any point when browsing, you can tap the “<em>Info</em>” icon to learn more about whatever it is you’re reading about. Evri provides an excerpt from Wikipedia with some important information, and a list of related topics, which can be very related or just somewhat related (George Clooney and Coffee?).</div>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
<img alt="evri news" border="0" class="aligncenter" data-mce-src="http://www.new-technology-news.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/0e60324db8h15_02.jpg.jpg" height="618" src="http://www.new-technology-news.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/0e60324db8h15_02.jpg.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="500" /></div>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
Another convenient thing you can do is go through your entire browsing history. On the top topics bar, scroll all the way to the right and look for the “<em>History</em>” tab. Here you’ll find a list, complete with times of the day, of all the topics you’ve browsed today, in the past week and in the past month. If you were browsing something really interesting and forgot to follow it, you can use the history to find it again.</div>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
<img alt="evri ipad app" border="0" class="aligncenter" data-mce-src="http://www.new-technology-news.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/dd11396a1ah14_37.jpg.jpg" height="587" src="http://www.new-technology-news.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/dd11396a1ah14_37.jpg.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="479" /></div>
<h2 style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
Bottom Line</h2>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
All in all, Evri provides a fun news-reading experience which you can use to find a specific news item, or to dive into the world of news and explore it deeply by jumping from link to link. The way Evri works, you’ll always get a list of related stories or related links, so you can pretty much go on browsing and reading news all day long.</div>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
I do wish they’d add some more ways to customize it, such as letting the user choose which topics appear on the left-side list, but even as it is, Evri is a polished iPad app and it helps you find your way through the news, instead of getting you lost.</div>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
Do you know of some more good news apps? What did you think of Evri? Share in the comments!</div>
<div style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto;">
<img alt="" data-mce-src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/Makeuseof/~4/4W2lO4azHQw" height="1" src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/Makeuseof/~4/4W2lO4azHQw" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px;" width="1" /></div>
</div>

Evri Turns The News Into A Colorful & Well Organized Experience [iPad]

Staying connected, something we all like to do these days, means reading e-mails everywhere, checking Facebook every hour, and also being...

Laptop magazine gives Lion the thumbs-up over Windows 7

Laptop magazine gives Lion the thumbs-up over Windows 7

This week, Laptop compared OS X Lion versus Windows 7 to determine which operating system was "better," both overall and i...

Review Roundup: This week's hottest reviews on TechRadar

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; line-height: 24px;"></span><br />
<div style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 12px; font: normal normal normal 13px/19px Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; max-width: 640px; padding-bottom: 0.6em; padding-left: 0.6em; padding-right: 0.6em; padding-top: 0.6em;">
<div mce_style="text-align: center;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: center;">
<img alt="Review Roundup: This week's hottest reviews on TechRadar" class="aligncenter" height="212" mce_src="http://cdn.mos.techradar.com//Review%20images/TechRadar/Home%20Entertainment/Samsung%20UE60D8000/SAM45491D-01-470-75.jpg" src="http://cdn.mos.techradar.com//Review%20images/TechRadar/Home%20Entertainment/Samsung%20UE60D8000/SAM45491D-01-470-75.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; clear: both; color: #444444; display: block; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 12px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px; max-width: 640px;" width="282" /></div>
<h3 style="color: black; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 20px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
This week's hottest reviews on TechRadar</h3>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Has the economy suddenly picked up? This week we got our hands on the fantastic 60-inch, 3D-capable and Smart TV-enabled UE60D8000 from Samsung, which doesn't come cheap at £4,300, and then the £1,000+ Asus MARS II Limited Edition graphics card landed on our desk.</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
At the other end of the spectrum we were impressed with the Samsung PL120, which can be picked up for under £100 and the Sony Ericsson Xperia Mini Pro, which is both small in price and size.</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Read on for this week's most popular reviews on TechRadar.</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Samsung UE60D8000 review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
When Samsung gave us exclusive access to its brand new flagship LCD TV, we were excited. It's hard not to be excited by these new Samsungs - just look at them. There's almost no bezel at all, which means the picture goes right to the very edge of the TV. The gorgeous looks are backed up by an equally gorgeous watching experience.</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Both 2D and 3D pictures are handled excellently and once you've experienced its mind-blowing big screen images, mesmerising design and class-leading smart functionality you'll be hunting around for £4,300 so you can own one. And if you can't raise that much cash, you can always check out the 55-inch or 46-inch versions.</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Asus MARS II Limited Edition review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Combining two Nvidia GeForce GTX 580 chips on one card, the Asus MARS II is by some distance the fastest and most powerful graphics card in existence. It weighs the same as six elephants, is bigger than a double decker bus and is probably worth more than your car. In certain benchmarks, the MARS II is 20 per cent quicker than any other card, although at times two GTX 580s in SLI come close.</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
It's not just the performance that impresses us, it's the temperature management and build quality. With a three-figure price tag it was never going to be a consumer's champion, but there's a lot on offer here for overclockers and modders beyond simply raw performance.</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
BlackBerry Torch 9860 review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
When is a BlackBerry not a BlackBerry? How about when the BlackBerry in question has no physical keyboard and is in fact RIM's first proper touchscreen smartphone? Yep, the BlackBerry Torch 9860 marks RIM's first foray into pure touchscreen control, without any of the SurePress shenanigans of the Storm 2 or the slide-out keyboard of the Torch 9800 and 9810.</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
With the improvements of BlackBerry OS 7 and better specs across the board, the result is largely a success. It's a slick package from afar, but using the BlackBerry Torch 9860 after the likes of the Samsung Galaxy S2, HTC Sensation or iPhone 4 feels like going back to 2009.</div>
<div mce_style="text-align: center;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: center;">
<img alt="BlackBerry torch 9860" class="aligncenter" height="202" mce_src="http://cdn.mos.techradar.com//Review%20images/TechRadar/Mobile%20phones/BlackBerry/BlackBerry%20Torch%209860/pr/Torch_9860-9850_BottomAngle-420-100.jpg" src="http://cdn.mos.techradar.com//Review%20images/TechRadar/Mobile%20phones/BlackBerry/BlackBerry%20Torch%209860/pr/Torch_9860-9850_BottomAngle-420-100.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; clear: both; color: #444444; display: block; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 12px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px; max-width: 640px;" width="252" /></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Sony Ericsson Xperia Mini Pro review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
So, just as Sony Ericsson accompanied its X10 Mini with the X10 Mini Pro in 2010, this year's excellent new Xperia Mini is now accompanied by a heavier, sturdier model of the same size, the Xperia Mini Pro. The new smartphone also has a slide-out QWERTY keyboard for those of you still stubbornly refusing to go 100% touchscreen</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Samsung PL120 review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
For £100, this is a camera that you'll get a lot of use out of, from holidays to updating your profile picture on Facebook. The tiny size means that it'll simply fit into a pocket when it's not being used and the price means if it does get broken, it doesn't cost the earth to replace.</div>
<div mce_style="text-align: center;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: center;">
<img alt="Samsung pl120" class="aligncenter" height="189" mce_src="http://cdn.mos.techradar.com//Review%20images/PhotoRadar/Samsung/PL120/press/samsung-pl120-1-420-100.jpg" src="http://cdn.mos.techradar.com//Review%20images/PhotoRadar/Samsung/PL120/press/samsung-pl120-1-420-100.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; clear: both; color: #444444; display: block; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 12px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px; max-width: 640px;" width="252" /></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Also reviewed this week:</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Audio systems</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Creative ZiiSound D5x & DSx system review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">AV receivers</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Pioneer VSX-2021 review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">CCTV</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Smart Witness Smart-i review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Compact cameras</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Samsung ST95 review</div>
<div mce_style="text-align: center;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: center;">
<img alt="Sasmung st95" class="aligncenter" height="189" mce_src="http://cdn.mos.techradar.com//Review%20images/PhotoRadar/Samsung/ST95/samsungst95f-420-100.jpg" src="http://cdn.mos.techradar.com//Review%20images/PhotoRadar/Samsung/ST95/samsungst95f-420-100.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; clear: both; color: #444444; display: block; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 12px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px; max-width: 640px;" width="252" /></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Components</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Kingston HyperX 240GB SSD review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Smart Witness Smart-i review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Coolers</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Cooler Master Hyper 612S review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Cooling</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Cooler Master Hyper 612S review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Desktop PCs</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Dino PC MediaJoy 3850 review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Ipod accessories</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Philips DS9010 review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Laptops</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Zoostorm 3390-2012/A review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Memory</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Patriot Gamer 2 AMD Black Edition review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Patriot Gamer 2 AMD Black Edition review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Mice</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Microsoft Touch Mouse review</div>
<div mce_style="text-align: center;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: center;">
<img alt="Microsoft touchmouse" class="aligncenter" height="189" mce_src="http://cdn.mos.techradar.com//Review%20images/TechRadar/Computing/Microsoft%20Touch%20Mouse/main-420-100.jpg" src="http://cdn.mos.techradar.com//Review%20images/TechRadar/Computing/Microsoft%20Touch%20Mouse/main-420-100.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; clear: both; color: #444444; display: block; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 12px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px; max-width: 640px;" width="252" /></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Mobile routers</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Three MiFi Huawei Wireless Modem E586 review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Monitors</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
iiyama ProLite X2472HD review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
LG D2342P Cinema 3D Monitor review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Motherboards</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Zotac Z68-ITX Wi-Fi review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Zotac Z68-ITX Wi-Fi review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Asus MARS II Limited Edition review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">NAS drives</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Promise Pegasus RAID R6 review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Radio tuners</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Q2 Internet Radio review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Storage</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Kingston HyperX 240GB SSD review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Tablets</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
ViewSonic ViewPad 10Pro review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Tablets accessories</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
iLuv iCK826 review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Hands on reviews:</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Cameras</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Hands on: Samsung Multiview MV800 review</div>
<div mce_style="text-align: center;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: center;">
<img alt="Samsung mv800" class="aligncenter" height="315" mce_src="http://img52.imageshack.us/img52/4862/smasungmv8001420100.jpg" src="http://img52.imageshack.us/img52/4862/smasungmv8001420100.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; clear: both; color: #444444; display: block; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 12px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px; max-width: 640px;" width="420" /></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Car tech</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Hands on: Ford SYNC review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Ebook reader</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Hands on: Sony Reader Wi-Fi PRS-T1 review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Gadgets</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Hands on: Sony Personal 3D Viewer HMZ-T1 review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Laptops</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Hands on: Acer Aspire S3 Series review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Mobile Phone</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Hands on: Samsung S5690 Galaxy Xcover review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Hands on: Samsung Wave 3 review</div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Tablets</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Hands on: Asus EeePad Slider review</div>
<div mce_style="text-align: center;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 24px; text-align: center;">
<img alt="EeePad slider" class="aligncenter" height="189" mce_src="http://img710.imageshack.us/img710/7312/photo420100.jpg" src="http://img710.imageshack.us/img710/7312/photo420100.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; clear: both; color: #444444; display: block; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 12px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px; max-width: 640px;" width="252" /></div>
</div>
</div>

Review Roundup: This week's hottest reviews on TechRadar

This week's hottest reviews on TechRadar Has the economy suddenly picked up? This week we got our hands on the fantastic 60-inch...

In Depth: What's new in Internet Explorer 10 Platform Preview 2

<p style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" class="aligncenter" height="90" src="http://img695.imageshack.us/img695/3020/main200200.jpg" width="120" /></p><br/>When IE head Dean Hachamovitch announced the first platform preview of IE 10 at the MIX conference in April he said further preview releases would be "between 8 and 12 weeks apart".<br/><br/>Platform Preview 2 arrives after 11 weeks and adds features for web apps, including Drag-drop and File Reader; so you can drag objects around on a web page - look for a magnetic fridge poetry demo on the IE test drive site soon - or drag files into browser windows to upload them and have that happen in the background.<br/><br/>File access is possibly the first feature from the HTML5 Labs previews to make it into IE.<br/><br/>PP2 also gets the web workers spec. Rob Mauceri, the lead program manager on the IE team, calls that "a popular request from developers" (we count it as the most common request in the IE blog after Flebox, which arrived in PP1) and it's going to make a big difference to the performance of web apps – and maybe your battery life.<br/><br/>With web workers, a web app can shift some code to a thread running in the background – so a game can be working out the next turn without slowing you down while you play (usually the JavaScript for that would slow down what you're doing).<br/><br/>This should work particularly well in IE because of the way the Chakra JavaScript engine can split code across multiple cores (and Microsoft's latest figures say that as of March 2011, the average PC has 2.4 cores).<br/><br/>Other browsers already support web workers, although Firefox 5 does not allow messages sent through a direct 'channel' between different pieces of background code which Microsoft says explains why PP2 does better than Firefox at its new Bellagio Fountain test drive demo.<br/><p style="text-align: center;"><img alt="IE10" class="aligncenter" height="161" src="http://img840.imageshack.us/img840/2152/bellagioff5242090.jpg" width="252" /></p><br/><strong>FASTER:</strong> <em>IE10 gets Web workers after other browsers…</em><br/><p style="text-align: center;"><img alt="IE10" class="aligncenter" height="268" src="http://img52.imageshack.us/img52/929/bellagioff5142090.jpg" width="420" /></p><br/><strong>FIREFOX 5:</strong> <em>…Microsoft says Firefox is slower at this test because it doesn't have message channels</em><br/><br/>PP2 is the first browser to support three new performance APIs, including the Page Visibility setting that the Chrome team has been suggesting web sites use to check if a page is in a background or tab or a minimised window.<br/><br/>"If a web app is pinging the server for data it could be doing a lot of work and increasing the cost of running that server, none of which is needed because the window isn't visible to the user," Mauceri explained.<br/><br/>The IE team confirmed that IE10 PP2 is "the same HTML5 engine seen in the recent public "Windows 8" demos". One new feature that would explain the snappiness of the interface reflowing as you change the size of windows is Media Query Listeners; instead of the browser having to check periodically to see if you've changed the window size, changing the size sends a message to the server that it's changed and might need a new layout.<br/><br/>IE10 PP2 is also the first browser to include CSS3 Positioned Floats (a spec Microsoft recently proposed to the W3C) and Rob Mauceri told us this is "part of the bigger picture of where reading is going online, towards a more print-like experience"; once you have a multi-column page flowing through a grid (all standards added in PP1), you want to be able to position a picture and have the columns flow around it – and that could be useful for web app layouts too.<br/><p style="text-align: center;"><img alt="IE10" class="aligncenter" height="172" src="http://img98.imageshack.us/img98/2241/bellagioff5442090.jpg" width="252" /></p><br/><strong>FULL HARDWARE:</strong> <em>Using hardware acceleration PP2 shows more fireflies…</em><br/><br/><img alt="IE10" src="http://img59.imageshack.us/img59/4753/bellagioff5342090.jpg" width="420" /><br/><br/><strong>CHROME:</strong> <em>It might run on XP but Microsoft shows Chrome lagging on this demo</em><br/><br/>There are also security improvements for embedding content like maps, ads or feeds form social networks in a web page using iframes; these will now run in a sandbox for extra security (again, something Microsoft tools us Firefox 5 doesn't support).<br/><br/>PP2 also adds HTML5 forms and fields that will only accept specific types of information like email addresses or telephone numbers (something Joe Marini first mentioned to us as coming in the Windows Phone version of IE in the Mango update, suggesting that might be a version somewhere between IE9 and IE10).<br/><br/>Mozilla evangelist Chris Blizzard recently told us Firefox is "almost as fast as IE9 and faster in some places" and Mike Belshie of the Chrome team showed background tabs in Chrome running faster than in IE9 at the Velocity conference this month (but using more battery to do it) but it looks like Microsoft is keeping up with performance improvements.<br/><br/>The IE team isn't afraid to point at problems in other browsers either.<br/><p style="text-align: center;"><img alt="IE10" class="aligncenter" height="161" src="http://img89.imageshack.us/img89/5622/bellagioff5742090.jpg" width="252" /></p><br/><strong>COLOURFUL IE10:</strong> <em>It's not enough to implement HTML5 if you get it wrong, says Microsoft</em><br/><br/>A demo titled 'how stuff works' (showing an HTML5 Canvas app that works  in Chrome and Firefox but displays the wrong colours) could almost be  called 'how IE10 works better'.<br/><p style="text-align: center;"><img alt="IE10" class="aligncenter" height="161" src="http://img687.imageshack.us/img687/7771/bellagioff5642090.jpg" width="252" /></p><br/><strong>OFF-COLOUR FIREFOX:</strong> <em>HTML5 is supposed to cope better with pages that aren't quite perfect – Firefox doesn't seem to manage that as well</em><br/><p style="text-align: center;"><img alt="IE10" class="aligncenter" height="161" src="http://img813.imageshack.us/img813/6679/bellagioff5542090.jpg" width="252" /></p><br/><strong>GREY GOOGLE:</strong> <em>Even worse, Chrome gets no colours at all</em><br/><br/>Although Mauceri diplomatically phrases  it as "we've made a lot of progress as an industry but there is still  work to do".<br/><br/>--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In Depth: What's new in Internet Explorer 10 Platform Preview 2

When IE head Dean Hachamovitch announced the first platform preview of IE 10 at the MIX conference in April he said further preview releases...

Flipboard updated, finally does Google Reader and Flickr right

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDjQJzkVpSAq7aRygzd_LNO2sgWA2FuNFIFF_U3qIEBpJg7xJzMJ8HWOGvRCsR3jkkaEt61DVupW5zli9qO8t5PhshrF2dpifmxWCUghO4q89mIgNbQZwlGdn1knsnX_mmRtQ-smtegb4/s1600/flipboard-2010-12-17.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="160" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDjQJzkVpSAq7aRygzd_LNO2sgWA2FuNFIFF_U3qIEBpJg7xJzMJ8HWOGvRCsR3jkkaEt61DVupW5zli9qO8t5PhshrF2dpifmxWCUghO4q89mIgNbQZwlGdn1knsnX_mmRtQ-smtegb4/s320/flipboard-2010-12-17.jpg" width="320"></a></div>  <br>
When we spent some quality time with Flipboard over the summer, when the iPad was still a new and exciting thing, we liked the idea but not so much the implementation -- there just wasn't enough stuff filling the pages of our pretend magazines. Since then Flipboard of course went on to win Apple's US iTunes iPad app of the year award and is now celebrating with a major update: Google Reader support.<br>
<br>

Flipboard updated, finally does Google Reader and Flickr right

When we spent some quality time with Flipboard over the summer, when the iPad was still a new and exciting thing, we liked the idea but n...

Review: Sony PRS-650 Reader Touch

<img src="http://cdn.mos.techradar.com//Review%20images/TechRadar/Gadgets/PRS-650/PRS-650-200-200.jpg"/><p>The tablet market may be casting a dark shadow over the future of the ebook reader, but there are still two big-name manufacturers out there who believe that a dedicated reading device is what consumers want.</p><p>Both Amazon with its Kindle and Sony with its Reader range are slogging it out to become the number one ebook reader manufacturer. </p><p>You wouldn't have failed to notice that Amazon has pumped a lot of money into advertising its Kindle on TVs and billboards. But Sony, with little fanfare, has managed to impress TechRadar with the fantastic quality of its latest Reader, the Sony PRS-650 Reader Touch.</p><p>This isn't the first time Sony has released a touchscreen ebook reader but it is the first time it has launched a decent one.</p><p>Touchsreen and e-ink usually goes together like water and oil; the two technologies aren't compatible due to the extra layer that has to go on top of the e-ink display to make it touch-friendly.</p><p>This extra layer makes touch that little more sluggish and renders the screen almost unreadable in direct sunlight due to added shine.</p><p>Given that one of e-ink's USPs is that it works well in direct sunlight, the first Sony Reader Touch was hampered by too many glitches to make is a decent touchscreen device.</p><p>Sony has gone a long way to rectify this and the results (which we will relay further on in the review) are quite special.</p><p><img alt="Sony prs-650 reader touch" src="http://mos.futurenet.com/techradar/Review%20images/TechRadar/Gadgets/Sony%20reader%20touch/sony-reader-touch10-420-90.jpg" width="420"></img></p><p>The Sony PRS-650 Reader Touch has been given a 6-inch screen with a 600 x 800 resolution. This is the same size as the original Sony Reader, but it's the build quality which has been improved dramatically.</p><p>An aluminium chassis replaces the dowdy plastic exterior of yore. This gives the Reader a nice weight – solid but far from too heavy. At 215g it won't give you arm and neck ache like the iPad does.</p><p>The chassis of the Sony Reader Touch is slim, too, at just 119 x 168 x 10mm, and Sony has made sure that every button on the device is flush to the bezel. This is a nice stylistic touch and one which means that you won't accidentally turn it on when it is in a bag.</p><p>As the Sony Reader does utilise touchscreen, the buttons on show are limited. On the front, just under the screen is a forward and back button for flipping pages and home, zoom and option buttons.</p><p><img alt="Sony prs-650 reader touch" src="http://mos.futurenet.com/techradar/Review%20images/TechRadar/Gadgets/Sony%20reader%20touch/sony-reader-touch9-420-90.jpg" width="420"></img></p><p>Situated on the bottom of the Sony Reader are a Micro USB port, volume control and 3.5mm jack.</p><p>The top features a sliding power button and two expandable memory slots: SD and MemoryStick. </p><p>Unfortunately Sony still seems intent of keeping the MemoryStick format alive. The slot may not take up much room on the top of the Reader Touch, but it does feel a little like overkill having both memory slots on board.</p><p><img alt="Sony prs-650 reader touch" src="http://mos.futurenet.com/techradar/Review%20images/TechRadar/Gadgets/Sony%20reader%20touch/sony-reader-touch7-420-90.jpg" width="420"></img></p><p>The only other noticeable feature on the Reader Touch is the stylus. Yes, the Sony Reader Touch comes with a stylus. This is a little strange considering how much the touchscreen has improved on the device, and is a feature which will become redundant in future renditions of the Reader Touch.</p><p>In our tests we hardly took the stylus out. Except to look at it to remind us what technology in 1999 looked like.</p><p><img alt="Sony prs-650 reader touch" src="http://mos.futurenet.com/techradar/Review%20images/TechRadar/Gadgets/Sony%20reader%20touch/sony-reader-touch1-420-90.jpg" width="420"></img></p><p>Switch the Sony PRS-650 Reader Touch on and it takes around 10 seconds to boot up your library of books. </p><p>The menu screen is nice and pleasant to look at. Sony has made significant improvements with its e-ink technology. It uses E Ink Pearl which is sharper, has a faster refresh rate and now comes with 16 levels of greyscale.</p><p>This does make a noticeable difference to the sharpness of the text on the screen.</p><p>The menu is broken down into your library of books (you get a number of books like <em>Doctor No</em> and <em>Pride And Prejudice</em> loaded on to the device). Your periodicals (newspaper articles), collections (books you have purchased) and any notes you have made.</p><p>This is where the Sony Reader Touch gets interesting. You have the ability to make notes on the books you read. You can underline, circle and scribble on the books you are reading. It is virtual graffiti and it is a great feature which is primed for students.</p><p>You can also double tap on words to load up the included dictionary to find out their definition.</p><p>And even better, you can find out the definition of foreign words as well, so there's no stopping you when reading even the most pretentious <em>la literature</em>.</p><p><img alt="Sony prs-650 reader touch" src="http://mos.futurenet.com/techradar/Review%20images/TechRadar/Gadgets/Sony%20reader%20touch/sony-reader-touch2-420-90.jpg" width="420"></img></p><p>The new and improved screen resolution means that the Reader Touch is a joy to use. Words sparkle on the page and even the page transition doesn't seem as jarring as normal e-ink readers. To get back to the menu screen you have to use the real home button.</p><p>Everything else though is done through the touchscreen. Sony has managed to create a touchscreen on the Sony Touch which does away with the shiny extra layer it had to put on its prior Touch ebook reader – this makes a world of difference. </p><p>Essentially Sony is using tiny sensors at the top and bottom of the screen which detect when a finger is present on the screen.</p><p>This means that swiping the screen can be done with the deftest of touches and there's no harder finger prodding when having to navigate menus.</p><p>E-Ink touchscreen displays are never going to compete with the capacitive screens of phones or tablets, but the screen on the Sony Reader Touch is a revelation for those who have tried touch on an e-ink device before.</p><p><img alt="Sony prs-650 reader touch" src="http://mos.futurenet.com/techradar/Review%20images/TechRadar/Gadgets/Sony%20reader%20touch/sony-reader-touc<strong>-420-90.jpg" width="420"></img></p><p>Other slight features include bookmarking and searching. Searching brings up a QWERTY keyboard, which isn't as responsive as we'd have liked, but there was no muddling of letters when typing out the names of books.</p><p>The Sony Reader Touch also makes for a decent PDF viewer. This is because any PDFs you feed into the device are automatically resized for ease of view.</p><p>It's not that great at viewing images, though. While the front covers of books are great in thumbnail form when they are blown up they are less than impressive. And swiping through the images makes the e-ink have something of a fit. It looks like the image is drowning in treacle before actually coming up to the surface. </p><p>As there is a 3.5mm jack, you can also load up the device with MP3s to listen to while reading your missives.</p><p>When it comes to internal memory, the Sony Reader Touch has 2GB which is around 1,200 ebooks. This is expandable with the two memory slots.</p><p><img alt="Sony prs-650 reader touch" src="http://mos.futurenet.com/techradar/Review%20images/TechRadar/Gadgets/Sony%20reader%20touch/sony-reader-touch8-420-90.jpg" width="420"></img></p><p>After playing with the Sony Reader for a number of weeks, we can vouch that the battery life is impressive. Having listened to MP3s and loaded up myriad ebooks we didn't have to charge it for at least a week. </p><p>Sony is promoting it as around two week's juice, but this must be with little action.</p><p>Sony is making the Reader Touch as open as possible, so the file formats it will take are plentiful. The main ones include: EPUB eBooks (Adept) BBeB eBook, PDF, Word, TXT and RTF.</p><p>This does a good job of masking the fact that Sony doesn't have the might of the Amazon Kindle Store to go with its ebook reader.</p><p>As it is sporting EPUB, you can download ebooks from most online stores out there, though. The one which you won't be able to is, for obvious reasons, the Kindle Store.</p><p><img alt="Sony reader prs-650 touch" src="http://mos.futurenet.com/techradar/Review%20images/TechRadar/Gadgets/Sony%20reader%20touch/sonyreader-google-420-90.jpg" width="420"></img></p><p>With the release of the Reader Touch, Sony is promoting that you can now rent books through 50 council library websites.</p><p>We found this was easy enough to do, but there are some interesting things with the renting. Even though it is a digital file, each library only has so many licences, so like a real library the book you want may well be 'out on loan'. You do get notified when the ebook is available, though.</p><p>It's a nice idea, but one which is currently limited. If more libraries sign up then it may well take off.</p><p>What is much better is the search function of the Sony Reader website which offers up all the free domain books Google has to offer.</p><p>This saves you a lot of time wading through the priced books which Google also offers.</p><p><img alt="Sony reader prs-650 reader tocuh" src="http://mos.futurenet.com/techradar/Review%20images/TechRadar/Gadgets/Sony%20reader%20touch/sony-reader-touch5-420-90.jpg" width="420"></img></p><p>The Sony PRS-650 Reader Touch is a mightily impressive piece of kit, but there are a few niggles with the product.</p><p>The biggest for us is its complete lack of wireless connectivity. That's right, there is no 3G or wireless, so downloading content on the go is a big no-no.</p><p>Amazon must have been extremely pleased about this, given that its latest Kindle offers Wi-Fi and/or 3G.</p><p>We have to admit that the amount of books you can pre-load onto a Reader Touch is more than you would probably get through in a lifetime, so there isn't that much need for wireless. </p><p>It does mean that you can't have RSS feeds on the device and those spur of the moment purchases of ebooks go out of the window.</p><p>The second niggle is the price. The Sony Reader Touch is an expensive bit of kit, priced at around £200.</p><p>In these wallet-tightening times this may be too much for some. But Sony has created a product well deserving of the price. </p><p>The aluminium chassis is one of the most desirable we have seen at any price, it feels perfect in the hand and is easy to read.</p><p>The quality of the touchscreen will blow most ebook reader naysayers away. But the price will unfortunately put others off – or at least turn them to the perfectly priced Amazon Kindle 3.</p><strong>Related Links</strong><ul><li><a href="http://www.techradar.com/news/world-of-tech/techradar-s-reviews-guarantee-622749">TechRadar's reviews guarantee</a></li></ul><img border="0" height="1" src="http://rss.feedsportal.com/c/669/f/9809/s/f3bd220/mf.gif" width="1"/><div class='mf-viral'><table border='0'><tr><td valign='middle'><a href="http://res.feedsportal.com/viral/sendemail2.html?title=Review%3A+Sony+PRS-650+Reader+Touch&link=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.techradar.com%2Freviews%2Fgadgets%2Fportable-video%2Fportable-media-players-recorders%2Fsony-prs-650-reader-touch-902213%2Freview%3Fsrc%3Drss%26attr%3Dall" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="http://res3.feedsportal.com/images/emailthis2.gif" /></a></td><td valign='middle'><a href="http://res.feedsportal.com/viral/bookmark.cfm?title=Review%3A+Sony+PRS-650+Reader+Touch&link=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.techradar.com%2Freviews%2Fgadgets%2Fportable-video%2Fportable-media-players-recorders%2Fsony-prs-650-reader-touch-902213%2Freview%3Fsrc%3Drss%26attr%3Dall" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="http://res3.feedsportal.com/images/bookmark.gif" /></a></td></tr></table></div><img height="1" src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/techradar/allnews/~4/NyFcl-FAmls" width="1"/>

Review: Sony PRS-650 Reader Touch

The tablet market may be casting a dark shadow over the future of the ebook reader, but there are still two big-name manufacturers out ther...