Nikon Coolpix L28 Review

PRICE IN INDIA

5,950

TECH2 RATING 

5.0

AVERAGE USER RATING 

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

5.0

How we test

CONTACT

Nikon

REVIEW

SPECIFICATIONS

There’s nothing more ideal than a simple point-and-shoot if you want an easy-to-use digital camera for casual shooting and 4x6 prints without spending too much. The Nikon Coolpix L27 and L28 are two budget point-and-shoot digital cameras out of the 17 models that Nikon launched around a month ago. Both models are stylish and compact, come in attractive body colours and feature 5x zoom lens. What sets them apart is the resolution. The L27 has a 16.1 megapixel sensor, which is a common feature these days. At a whopping 20.1 megapixel, the L28 has the highest resolution in its class—sounds interesting? Here’s our take on it. A 20 megapixel point-and-shoot with 5x optical zoom Design and features The L28 is not larger than a pack of cards. Weighing in at 164 grams (with batteries), it’s quite portable and doesn’t burden the pocket. The camera is available in four colours. Go in for pink or silver if you like light shades. Prefer dark? Go in for all-black or maroon. Note that only the front part of the shell (including the sides) is coloured and sports glossy finish. The rear half bearing the LCD monitor and control panel is matte black. The front of the camera features the AF-assist light and a tiny flash strobe in one corner. The lens of the L28 starts from 26 mm and extends to 130 mm, which translates to 5x optical zoom. The zoom comes in handy to shoot close-ups from short distances. However, the lack of optical image stabilisation makes it challenging to get blur-free handheld shots in low light.  Slim and compact design The rear of the camera is dominated by a 3-inch LCD monitor and the control panel to its right. The control panel comprises a 5-way D-pad and a dedicated button for video recording in the top right corner. The D-pad has shortcuts to the function you would use the most—flash settings, EV, macro mode and self-timer. Buttons for selecting shooting modes and playback button lie above the D-pad. Right at the bottom are buttons for menu and delete. Uses a pair of AA batteries The L28 is powered by a pair of two AA batteries, which is an advantage in one way. If the camera runs out of juice, you can use spare batteries as it isn’t difficult to find AA batteries. User interface The L28 is a point-and-shoot in the literal sense. It doesn’t offer much than allowing you to point at the subject and shoot. You can choose from four shooting modes—Auto, Easy Auto, Scene and Smart Portrait. The Easy Auto mode analyses the subject and scene and uses optimal settings. All you can do is just adjust the EV, enable or disable flash and use the self-timer. The Auto mode is equivalent to Program mode minus ISO setting. You can set the white balance, use the burst mode and colour options in addition to what’s available in Easy Auto mode. Colour options include Vivid, Black-and-white, Sepia and Cyanotype. The Scene mode has 18 presets including the usual ones such as Portrait, Landscape, Sports, Sunset, Food, Fireworks, Backlight and Pet. Smart Portrait is a notch better than the Portrait scene preset. You can use skin softening and smile timer (releases the shutter when the subject smiles). The camera uses face detection for this feature. A useful feature is the option to crop photos when you’re viewing them. You simply have to zoom into the part of the frame you wish to crop and then press the Menu button to save what you see on the camera’s screen as a separate file. We would have liked if there was an option to apply colour effects to photos in playback mode. Here, you can only apply skin softening, rotate the frame and rescale the photo to 640 x 480 pixels (Small Picture). The Small Picture comes in handy when you want to rescale photos for uploading to social networks and online galleries. The L28 offers four shooting modes – Scene mode selected Video recording is supported at up to 1280 x 720 at 30 fps. Optical zoom is locked while shooting videos, but you can use digital zoom, which isn’t of much help. The user interface of the L28 is pretty straightforward. The lack of too many controls explains this camera is for those who want a no-nonsense point-and-shoot. Even if you’re a novice, you’ll get used to this camera in a matter of minutes. Most probably you won’t need to refer to the user manual at all. Build quality and ergonomics Despite being a budget camera, the L28 has a premium feel. The quality of the shell and buttons is very good and the curvaceous design is spot on. The camera is perfect for single-handed use, but we suggest using the wrist strap. The bulge around the battery compartment and a dimpled thumb grip next to the video recording button lend a good grip. You’ll find it comfortable to use even if you have large hands. The buttons and D-pad are slightly small due to the compact form, but they have a good tactile response and are in comfortable reach of the thumb.

Page 1:

Design and features-Build

Page 2:

Performance-Sample shots-Verdict

Page 3:

Specifications

REVIEWS / LAPTOPS / HEWLETT PACKARD, PERSONAL SYSTEM GROUP, INDIA

HP 2000-2202TU Review

09 Mar, 2013, 9:27 am IST | by Anand Tuliani | 

Laptops

PRICE IN INDIA

30,467

TECH2 RATING 

6.0

AVERAGE USER RATING 

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

8.5

How we test

CONTACT

Hewlett Packard, Personal System Group, India

  NA

  +91 11 2638 8000/ Toll free: 1800 4254 999

  http://www8.hp.com/in/en/home.html

REVIEW

SPECIFICATIONS

Using older-generation platform and hardware that just about meets the minimum system requirements is a common means adopted by most laptop manufacturers to churn out wallet-friendly offerings, and this is inevitable to stay in competition. It would have been nice if latest-generation models were available in the same price bracket, but nevertheless, the second-generation Intel platform has the muscle to handle Windows 8 and basic everyday tasks. The HP 2000-2202TU uses a slightly dated configuration, but offers good bang for the buck, not to mention it comes with Windows 8 and a bonus feature that we’ll talk about later in the review. Here’s what it has to offer. An affordable Windows 8 laptop with a 15.6-inch display Design and features You can tell by the design that the HP 2000 is an entry-level notebook—it’s very simple, yet elegant thanks to the generous use of gloss. The shiny lid sports a large HP logo imprinted at the bottom corner, close to the hinge. It looks classy so long as it’s devoid of fingerprints, dust particles and scratches, which it attracts too easily. The same goes with the palm rest on either side of the touchpad. Rest your palm on the touchpad for a second and you’ll be able to see the impression clearly. If you’re obsessive about keeping things clean and shiny, you’ll want to clean the glossy surfaces every now and then. Mind you, don’t use a piece of denim, tissue or rough fabric to clean, or else you’ll end up with faint scratches that will remain forever—a microfibre cloth would be most ideal and should have been bundled in the package. The laptop comes across as black at the first glance, but if you notice carefully, the glossy surface area is black licorice in colour and has a very slight hint of brown. The rest of the body work, including the frame, keyboard area and base of the chassis is matte black. Looks classy so long as you keep it shiny and sparkling Open the lid and you’ll be greeted by a slick 15.6-inch display that has a resolution of 1366 x 768 pixels. The keyboard is island-type and slightly sunk into the chassis. Since the laptop is on the larger side due to the 15.6-inch display, we expected the keyboard to have a numeric pad, which is missing. It seems HP has chosen to go with a more ergonomic keyboard with larger and well-spaced keys. The touchpad is regular with left and right click buttons at its base. It has a fine dimpled texture, which prevents resistance caused by the fingertip sticking to the surface, especially when your hands are sweaty. If you take a close look at the touchpad, you’ll find a tiny depression at the top right corner. Double-tapping on it disables the touchpad, which is indicated by a tiny LED just next to it. It’s a handy feature should you want to prevent unnecessary mouse movements and accidental clicks while typing. Two USB 3.0 ports and HDMI output Being an older platform, you get only USB 2.0 ports. Two of them are placed on the right side in line with the tray-loading DVD writer and one is placed on the left side amidst a D-sub port, Gigabit Ethernet port, an HDMI port, 3.5 mm jacks for headphone and mic, and card reader. The features mentioned until this point of the review are common for all models in the HP 2000 series. It’s the core that differs between models. The HP 2000-2202TU that was sent to us for review by HP runs the second-generation Intel Core i3-2328M processor (dual-core and clocked at 2.2GHz). Now, this is a bit disappointing; the laptop comes with only 2GB RAM and 500GB hard drive that has a spindle speed of 5400 rpm. At least 4GB RAM and a 7200 rpm hard drive would have made a remarkable difference in performance, but that would have pushed the cost much further than the Rs 30,000 mark, and that is inclusive of the Windows 8 64-bit operating system. As for the bonus bit that we mentioned in the beginning, select HP laptops (2000 series included) that ship with Windows 8 include a year’s subscription to HP Connected Music. It’s a service that lets you listen to streamed music and also download tracks free of charge, for which HP has tied up with Hungama.com and Universal Music. HP claims the large catalogue of music includes over one million songs by more than 20,000 artistes spanning multiple genres including Bollywood, Devotional, Rock, Jazz, Hip Hop and Country among others. Users can renew the subscription after a year, the cost of which HP is currently working on. Most of the IO are placed on the left side A shortcut is present on the desktop that signs you into the service after you activate the subscription. You’re taken to the HP Connected Music webpage in the default web browser from where you can browse categories and playlists, listen to tracks and even download them. But there’s a catch; streamed playback doesn’t play entire tracks—it’s meant to give you a 30 second preview should you want to get a taste before downloading the full tracks. Page 1: Design and features Page 2: Build quality-Performance-Verdict Page 3: Specifications

You love your PC. It's a place you can work at, but more importantly, it's a place you can game at. The thing is, if you're using a traditional desk-and-chair setup, the more you game on the PC, the bigger the problem you're creating for yourself.

I don't want to sound like your mother here, but sitting - or, as many of you probably do, slouching - in a chair at a desk for a massive session of DOTA 2, or Skyrim, or whatever, isn't exactly the healthiest thing for you. Especially if you're doing it for hours at a time.

That's why workplaces give you breaks. It's why airlines recommend you move around every few hours. Indeed, in terms of everything from blood circulation to food digestion to calorie-burning, sitting down for extended periods of time is one of the worst things you can be doing to your body short of putting poison in it or having something hit you very hard.

But it's OK. I'm here to help. You don't need to stop your ten-hour gaming sessions to save your body. You just need to change the way you're sitting. Or, well, stop sitting altogether.

Sure, you could just get a really good chair and remember to take breaks, but good chairs are expensive, and taking breaks is for cowards (or, more seriously, something even those with the best intentions can easily forget if they're immersed in a game). So last year, I went a little further and jumped on the standing office bandwagon, partly because I was about to lose my office to a newborn child, but mostly because I was finding it detrimental to my health. Because I work 9-10 hour days, then spend most of my gaming time at the same PC afterwards, I'd get a sore back, a sore neck and pain in my hips. I wasn't overweight, per se, but let's say that despite being fairly active outside of work hours, I wasn't exactly fighting fit.

Worst of all, sitting down all day just made me feel horrible. Like I was ending my day in a thick fog, having been in the same position, in the same room, for most of my waking hours.

Having looked at various internet guides, I found most to be either too crummy for my needs (more suited to the occasional user) or prohibitively expensive.

Ignore those guides. If you feel like getting a little more active and trying this out, you can go to IKEA and get a kickass desk for under $200 (around $170), meaning most of you, regardless of where you live, can easily do the same. Below you'll find the various components for the desk I put together a few months back which you can see above. It's a Frankenstein's Monster approach, I know, but it still looks pretty good!

Desk

Vika Kaj adjustable legs ($15 ea.)

The only way you can get a standing desk this cheap is to improvise, and the only way to do that at IKEA is to get these legs, which extend enough to accommodate all but the tallest of you.

Linmon Table ($25)

Because you're just putting a piece of wood on some legs, you can opt for any tabletop, really, but I liked the Linmon because despite the gloosy white finish, it was super cheap.

Storage

Ekby Alex ($55)

Pricey for what it is, since it's really just a little box with some shelves inside, but you need somewhere to put a monitor and speakers, so you may as well put them somewhere you can also store miscellaneous crap inside as well.

Signum ($10)

This standing setup doesn't have the luxury of letting you dump 17 cables and power adapters in the corner, so you need something tidier. This does the trick. Just bolt it underneath the tabletop.

Summera ($20)

Basically a cradle for your PC, it lets you sling your computer under the table and keep it off the ground. Not a necessity, but it sure makes cleaning the area - and accessing your PC - a lot easier than most traditional setups.

One more thing you can't get from IKEA, but which you'll definitely need, is a mat. They'll be called different things depending on where you live, but you know those thick rubber mats security guards stand on? Yeah, you'll want one of those.

All the pieces attach easily to the main tabletop, either with framed bolts or, in the case of the legs, there are pre-drilled holes already under the table. So there's minimal "DIY" work to be done aside from a whole lot of screwing in screws.

—-

An important thing to note is that this isn't for everyone. Maybe you've got a bad ankle. Maybe you've got nowhere else to put that fancy office chair but under a desk. That's OK! Nobody is forcing you to do this. I'm just saying it's something you could totally just try.

Another thing is that if you do try this out, as my colleague Kirk Hamilton's butt will attest, there is a little adjustment period. Usually around two weeks, while your legs and back get used to all the standing. Once that's done, though, as insane as this sounds, your body really won't mind. You should be able to stand for hours at a time and be totally fine, because you will have guns, only not on your arms. On your legs.

Read More...

Back in 2004 when Canonical was just getting started with Ubuntu, its founder, Mark Shuttleworth, opened a bug report about a major problem for the new operating system: Microsoft dominated the arena with a majority market share.

This tongue-in-cheek ticket has finally been closed with a status of “Fix Released,” as Shuttleworth feels that Microsoft no longer has the same majority share they held on to for so long. Microsoft certainly still reigns supreme in the desktop/laptop space, but he argues that with the ubiquity of smartphone and tablet operating systems, this is no longer the case.

Android, iOS, and other platforms now make up a considerable chunk of operating systems on the market, and as smartphones and tablets continue their rapid proliferation, this isn’t likely to change any time soon.

Shuttleworth wrote in a comment for “bug 1” that these alternative platforms mark a healthy competition, and that it is important for them to recognize the shift that has taken place.

“Android may not be my or your first choice of Linux, but it is without doubt an open source platform that offers both practical and economic benefits to users and industry. So we have both competition, and good representation for open source, in personal computing.”

Earlier this week in Mary Meeker’s annual Internet Trends Report, Meeker focused heavily on mobile, stating that it has continued to gain momentum quickly and shows no signs of slowing down. Android an iOS collectively hold a 65 percent share of computing devices, compared to Windows’ 35 percent.

Read More...

Formerly known as Windows Blue, Windows 8.1 is shaping up to be a sizeable update for Windows 8. However, ifMicrosoft's blog post is any indication, the service pack-like upgrade remains ostensibly focused on touchscreen users with nearly all of its changes pertaining to Windows 8's Metro user interface.

For users with an aversion to 8's Modern UI, the blog details few improvements exclusively conducive to keyboard and mouse usage: the addition of a start button (the "classic" start menu remains absent, however), configurable hot corners and the ability to "boot into alternate screens". One item not mentioned in the post but found elsewhere indicates that users will finally be able to boot directly to the desktop, rather than be forcibly dumped into the Metro Start Screen upon log on.

Some Start Screen improvements ought to overlap with a better overall desktop experience though. Better Start Screen searching is one such enhancement; Windows 8 will now search for apps, settings and files as opposed to just apps, settings or files. The search also integrates Bing and web searching, which may or may not be a bonus, depending.

Additionally, the Start Screen should appear less jarring to desktop users switching between the two; by default, it now shares the same background as your desktop wallpaper. This may just be a psychovisual trick, but it does provide the illusion of visual continuity -- the Metro Start Screen will no longer appear to cover up the entire desktop but incorporate it to some small degree. The screen will also be more customizable as well, with the addition of more colors and moving backgrounds.

Internet Explorer 11 will also be making its debut in Windows 8.1. Metro IE users will be able to adjust the appearance of IE11 (e.g. always show the address bar) while unlimited tabs and tab syncing are now built-in for your convenience.

Other Metro-ey changes include redesigned Calculator, Music, Store and Photo apps as well as better SkyDrive integration. Also, gone will be the need to fire up Control Panel to change most system configuration settings -- Microsoft says all the options found in Control Panel will now be available under Metro's PC Settings panel. This is a particularly nice addition for tablet users who previously needed to open Control Panel (i.e. dumping them to the desktop) to manage user privileges, change display settings, alter power options or perform a multitude of other system activities.

Read More...

Mary Meeker has unveiled her second annual Internet Trends report at the D11 conference. Meeker is a partner at the venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and follows up her famed first report with highlights on the growth of global internet usage and the aggressive momentum of the mobile web.

The biggest trend that persists through much of Meeker’s report is the incline of mobile traffic versus regular internet traffic. Mobile now accounts for 15 percent of total global internet traffic, and is likely to maintain a trajectory of 1.5x growth year-over-year, according to Meeker.

Compared to TV advertising, there is a large disparity in the amount of time consumers spend on mobile devices relative to the amount of money being spent on advertising. While we collectively spend 12 percent of our consumption time on mobile devices, mobile advertising dollars only account for 3 percent of total spending. Between that huge gap, and the smaller 4 percent difference in regular internet advertising, Meeker says that there is approximately a $20 billion dollar opportunity in the United States for growth.

2013 also saw the domination of tablets reach new heights, as they overtook both laptops and desktops in global shipments. The slide below shows the profound difference in the rise in popularity between tablets and laptops/desktops. Tablets took only three years from their introduction to overtake other form factors.

Another staggering metric Meeker presented is the 500 million+ photos shared each day on various internet services, which is poised to double within the next 12 months. This perhaps lends credence to the expensive acquisitions of Instagram by Facebook and Flickr by Yahoo.

View the full slideshow below.

Read More....

Regular TechSpot readers will have no doubt spotted several mentions of Haswell on our front page this year. In the past few months we have covered everything from model names to performance and battery life claims. A key focus has been Haswell's graphics, with rumors suggesting its performance is set to be 2 to 3 times that of current HD 4000 integrated graphics.

So what is Haswell exactly? It is Intel’s 4th generation Core architecture which will see a major refresh of the entire Core i3, Core i5 and Core i7 product lineup in 2013. Whereas last year’s Ivy Bridge was a "tick" release, Haswell is a tock and traditionally that's meant a more significant advance forward.

Efficiency and graphics have remained key areas of focus for Intel in the last couple of generations and Haswell is no different. Intel did claim that Ivy Bridge was a "tick+" due to the more significant overhaul to the graphics side of things. Even so, despite providing up to twice as much graphics performance as Sandy Bridge under certain scenarios, it was still very underwhelming 3D rendering power when compared to discrete solutions.

And the time has finally come. Haswell is ready to be unveiled, along with Intel’s latest on-die GPU solutions. Today we'll only be checking out the new HD 4600 Graphics which comes as part of the high-end Core i7-4770K desktop processor. Faster HD 5000 Graphics and Iris Graphics 5100 and 5200 solutions will also become available starting today. As expected, the most powerful integrated graphics solutions are being reserved for processors designed for mobile devices, such as Ultrabooks.

4th Gen Intel Core CPU Family

The Haswell lineup is comprised of several desktop and mobile Core i7 and Core i5 processors that will effectively replace most of the current offerings under those series. Core i3 variants will make it to market later in the year.

The new Core i7 desktop processors include the Core i7-4770K, i7-4770R, i7-4770T, i7-4770S, i7-4770 and i7-4765T -- all selling for $303 except for the i7-4770K that sells for a slight premium at $339. The Core i7-4770K and i7-4770 are identical in almost every way with a few exceptions. The K version comes with an unlocked multiplier and is 100MHz faster out of the box. The Intel vPro/TXT/VT-d/SIPP technologies have also been removed from the K series.

The Core i7-4770S and i7-4770T are members of the low power series and as such the TDP has been reduced from 84w down to 65w and 45w, respectively. A determining factor in achieving this lower consumption is a lower CPU base frequency, reduced from 3.50GHz to just 3.10GHz for the i7-4770S and 2.50GHz for the i7-4770T.

All Haswell Core i7 desktop processors feature 4 cores with 8 concurrent threads when using Hyper-Threading. The Core i7-4770K operates at 3.50GHz with a Turbo Boost frequency of 3.90GHz, while the non-K version features the same Turbo Boost frequency with a base clock of 3.4GHz. They are designed to work with DDR3-1333/1600 memory and feature an 8MB L3 cache.

The most interesting of the Core i7 range is the 4770R, which operates at 3.20GHz with a Turbo frequency of 3.90GHz and uses the BGA package. This model dumps the HD 4600 Graphics used by all other desktop Core i7 processors and instead opts for the more powerful Iris Pro Graphics 5200. The only downside to this chip is the L3 cache reduction from 8MB to 6MB.

Intel is also offering a lower clocked model, the Core i7-4765T which has a TDP of just 35 watts and comes clocked at just 2.0GHz with a 3.0GHz maximum Turbo frequency.

Then there is the new Core i5 series which features the i5-4670K, i5-4670 and i5-4570 processors priced at $242, $213 and $192, respectively. There are also the Core i5-4670T, i5-4670S, i5-4570S, i5-4570T and Core i5-3450S low power models. We know, it gets very confusing, so let’s talk about the standard processors first.

All standard Ivy Bridge Core i5 processors carry an 84W TDP and feature four cores and four concurrent threads. The only Core i5 processor to differ from this configuration is the i5-4570T which features two cores with Hyper-Threading for four threads.

The Core i5 range is clocked aggressively: the i5-4670K and i5-4670 operate at 3.40GHz with a Turbo Boost frequency of 3.80GHz. Meanwhile the i5-4570 is clocked at 3.20GHz with a Turbo frequency of 3.6GHz.

All Core i5 processors feature a 6MB L3 cache, with the exception of the i5-4570T, which has been downgraded to 3MB. All desktop Core i5 processors use the HD Graphics 4600 engine without exception.

The low-power Core i5 range is equally confusing. The four models available at launch are different, though many of them occupy the same price range. The Core i5-4570T is essentially a Core i3 processor with Turbo Boost added. This processor operates at 2.90GHz with a Turbo Boost speed of 3.60GHz. However like the Core i3 processors, the i5-4570T features only two cores with Hyper-Threading support and a smaller 3MB L3 cache, it is said to cost $192.

Then there is the Core i5-4670T and i5-4670S (both $213). The i5-4670T features a thermal design rating of 45w and works at 2.30GHz with a Turbo Boost frequency of 3.30GHz. The i5-4670S is actually faster, working at a base clock of 3.1GHz with a Turbo Boost frequency of 3.8GHz. As you would expect the i5-4670S has a higher TDP rating of 65w.

Finally, we have the Core i5-4570S and i5-4570T processors (both $192) which feature a TDP rating of 65w and 35w, respectively. Both CPUs have a base clock of 2.90GHz with a Turbo Boost frequency of 3.60GHz.

Republished with Permission.

Read More...