Viewsonic has launched two new tablets at CES 2012 – the ViewPad 10pi and the ViewPad 10e. While the ViewPad 10e is a standard Android tablet, the ViewPad 10pi is a dual booting tablet which runs both Android and Windows.

Viewsonic ViewPad 10pi Specifications

The Viewsonic ViewPad 10pi comes with an Intel Oak Trail z670 processor clocked at 1.5 GHz and 2 GB of RAM. It also offers a 64 GB SSD and sports a 10.1 inch IPS display with a resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels. It also comes with Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth 2.1 with EDR and optional 3G connectivity support.

It also offers a microSD card slot, and 2 USB ports. It has a primary 3 MP camera, as well as a secondary 1.3 MP camera. It is powered by a 3200 mAh battery, and runs Android 2.3 Gingerbread as well as Windows 7 Professional in a dual booting setup.

Viewsonic ViewPad 10e Specifications

The Viewsonic ViewPad 10e is a standard Android 2.3 Gingerbread tablet, which comes with a 9.7 inch IPS display with a resolution of 1024 x 768 pixels. It is powered by a 1 GHz ARM Cortex A8 processor and 512 MB of RAM. It offer 4 GB of internal storage, and microSD card support. It also has Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, and Bluetooth 3.0. It sports a 1.3 MP camera on the front face, and comes with a 5400 mAh battery.

The pricing for either tablet hasn’t been announced yet.

Check out our complete CES 2012 coverage: Techie-Buzz @ CES 2012

Yes, Techie-Buzz is still a technology blog. We still couldn’t help having Shahrukh Khan feature twice here in the last couple of months. In October, I wrote about Shahrukh Khan’s aggressive digital marketing for his film RA.One. Now, for his upcoming release, Don 2, Microsoft India in partnership with Excel Entertainment, the producers of the film, has launched a unique contest which gives winners a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to meet SRK and travel to Berlin.

To enter the Meet the Don2: Mission Berlin contest, you need to buy one of the Microsoft products Windows 7 PC, Windows Phone, Microsoft Office 2010, or Xbox 360 from a retail store in the contest period and then answer five simple questions and write a catchy slogan at www.MissionBerlin.in. The contest runs from November 25th to December 20th, 2011. If your entry is shortlisted, you will be asked to send a copy of the invoice as a proof of purchase.

The first 1000 correct and complete entries will win 4 tickets to the first day first show of Don 2 to watch it with family and friends. Top five winning families with best slogan will get a chance to meet Shahrukh Khan in person. And one of the luckiest family amongst these will win an all-expenses-paid trip to the beautiful, historic city of Berlin. Don 2 is shot in Berlin and the sightseeing arrangements include trips to shooting spots!

Well, Microsoft India just made the futile chase to Don possible!

Last month, Dell announced the new Dell Latitude ST tablet for business, healthcare and education. This tablet runs on the Windows 7 Operating System. Dell Latitude ST is ideal for any organization where employees need to run a core set of applications in safe computing environments. It allows you to connect the tablet to projectors, printers or other devices using built-in ports. Within a month of its official announcement, Dell finally launched this tablet in India. Check out the complete specs below.

Dell Latitude ST Specifications:

• 10.1″ WXGA touchscreen display
• 1280 x 800 pixels resolution
• Pen & Touch Input
• Intel Atom Z670 processor
• Genuine Windows 7 Ultimate OS
• Mobile Intel SM35 Chipset
• Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 600
• Dell Wireless 802.11 a/b/g/n
• 3G Connectivity
• Bluetooth 4.0 LE Combo Card
• Dell Wireless 5550 Single-mode HSPA+ Mini Card
• A-GPS
• Up to 2 GB DDR2 SDRAM
• Up to 128 GB Solid State hard drive
• High Quality Mono Speaker
• Stereo headphone/Microphone combo jack
• Integrated digital microphone
• 5 megapixel rear facing camera
• Integrated 720p HD front facing video webcam
• USB 2.0
• SD Memory card reader
• HDMI
• Digital Pen garage
• Docking Connector

Dell Latitude ST weighs 816 g. This tablet comes with a price tag of Rs.36,000. You can also get the optional Docking station for an additional price of Rs.8,000. To learn more, check out the video below.

With the iPhone 4S set to shatter sales records the competition better have something up their sleeves to compete. For Microsoft the upcoming holiday season is going to be tricky. As Todd Bishop at GeekWire points out, the company has a new range of Windows Phone 7 Mango handsets coming out but besides that they don’t have any other new product for users.

Many enthusiasts have been wondering why Microsoft does not talk about the consumer ecosystem it has created. In the coming days, Microsoft will be changing that. The core premise is Windows enabling families stay connected and have a great time with technology. Microsoft shared two advertisements talking about the concept:

The second ad Dog.ppt is a pretty cool ad but I have my doubts about the first one. (I am not the only one.)

Microsoft is rumored to  be investing several Million Dollars for OEM partners for advertising their Windows Phone 7 handsets and it looks like HTC is making good use of it. Spotted by WinRumors’ Tom Warren, the HTC WP7 ad aired in the UK is nicely done. Wrapping features around what the phone enables you to do is always a better message than telling us specs and features. Here’s the ad:

Microsoft UK has another HTC WP7 ad that is eye catching. Both ads show promise and in fact as Tom Warren says, Microsoft should have more ads done by the creative agency behind the HTC WP7 ads.

Microsoft Australia had probably one of the coolest launch show for a developer software. Long Zheng wrote about Microsoft Australia putting up a light show using office lights of two building to launch LightSwitch for Visual Studio. Here’s the video of a very un-Microsoft launch:

Microsoft has released Microsoft Camera Codec Pack that enables the viewing of a variety of device-specific file formats. The codec pack allows you to import, organize, and edit RAW files without using third-party plugins or applications.

A RAW file is the uncompressed output from each of the original pixels on the camera’s image sensors. RAW files have higher image quality than JPEG files and have more image information. Microsoft Camera Codec Pack lets you view RAW files from over 120 digital SLR devices in Windows Live Photo Gallery as well as in Windows Explorer. The files can also be viewed in other applications that are based on Windows Imaging Codecs (WIC). This pack is available in both the x86 and x64 versions for Windows Vista Service Pack 2 and Windows 7.

Once the codec pack is installed, you can edit copies of your RAW images in Windows Live Photo Gallery. Within Photo Gallery, make a JPEG or JPEG-XR (or HD-photo) copy of the original photo, and then apply different editing effects available. You can even use the RAW files to stitch panoramas using Photo Gallery.

The Microsoft Camera Codec Pack provides support for the following device formats:

• Canon: EOS 1000D (EOS Kiss F in Japan and the EOS Rebel XS in North America), EOS 10D, EOS 1D Mk2, EOS 1D Mk3, EOS 1D Mk4, EOS 1D Mk2 N, EOS 1Ds Mk2, EOS 1Ds Mk3, EOS 20D, EOS 300D (the Kiss Digital in Japan and the Digital Rebel in North America) , EOS 30D, EOS 350D (the Canon EOS Kiss Digital N in Japan and EOS Digital Rebel XT in North America), EOS 400D (the Kiss Digital X in Japan and the Digital Rebel XTi in North America), EOS 40D, EOS 450D (EOS Kiss X2 in Japan and the EOS Rebel XSi in North America), EOS 500D (EOS Kiss X3 in Japan and the EOS Rebel T1i in North America), EOS 550D (EOS Kiss X4 in Japan, and as the EOS Rebel T2i in North America), EOS 50D, EOS 5D, EOS 5D Mk2, EOS 7D, EOS D30, EOS D60, G2, G3, G5, G6, G9, G10, G11, Pro1, S90
• Nikon: D100, D1H, D200, D2H, D2Hs, D2X, D2Xs, D3, D3s, D300, D3000, D300s, D3X, D40, D40x, D50, D5000, D60, D70, D700, D70s, D80, D90, P6000
• Sony: A100, A200, A230, A300, A330, A350, A380, A700, A850, A900, DSC-R1
• Olympus: C7070, C8080, E1, E10, E20, E3, E30, E300, E330, E400, E410, E420, E450, E500, E510, E520, E620, EP1
• Pentax (PEF formats only): K100D, K100D Super, K10D, K110D, K200D, K20D, K7, K-x, *ist D, *ist DL, *ist DS
• Leica: Digilux 3, D-LUX4, M8, M9
• Minolta: DiMage A1, DiMage A2, Maxxum 7D (Dynax 7D in Europe, α-7 Digital in Japan)
• Epson: RD1
• Panasonic: G1, GH1, GF1, LX3

While the Windows Phone 7 fans advocate putting the Windows Phone 7 OS on tablets and others eagerly wait to see what Microsoft has done with Windows 8 for non-PC devices, Japanese hardware manufacturer Fujitsu has other ideas. Fujitsu has introduced F-07C, a Windows 7 powered mobile phone!

Hardware

Fujitsu claims that the F-07C mobile phone is world’s smallest PC that fits into the palm of the hand. The phone is powered by Intel Atom Z600 processor and includes 1GB memory and 32 GB solid-state drive. Most netbook computers in the industry are powered by Intel Atom processors. For connectivity, F-07C provides both 3G as well as Wireless LAN IEEE 802.11b/g/n options.

Users can switch between a Windows 7 PC mode and a regular mobile phone mode with push of a button. The phone sports a QWERTY keyboard, a trackball, and a left-click button that enables simple mouse-like operations. The 4 inch wide SVGA LCD screen provides a high-resolution 1024 x 600 display. A USB/HDMA cradle set sold separately allows the user to connect to peripheral devices like keyboard/mouse or printer. Surprisingly, the phone also packs in an HDMA output connector to hook up the phone to a large-screen TV for bigger display.

Software

Fujitsu F-07C runs on Windows 7 Home Premium edition (with Service Pack 1) and comes with a two-year license for Microsoft Office Personal 2010′. I’m not sure what  a Personal edition offers though.

The mobile phone supports several latest services from Docomo like Osaifu-Keitai, i-mode mail, i-concier, and security features like Omakase Lock and Mobile Phone Location Service.

Thoughts

The phone is scheduled to launch in Japan on July 23 in partnership with NTT Docomo. I’m not sure if the phone would interest many even though the hardware specifications are  great.  While smartphone operating systems are getting smarter, there is little need for a desktop operating system on a mobile phone. A limited 2 hour battery life in Windows 7 mode is of no help. The user experience for Windows 7 on a 4 inch wide screen is awkward, and absence of a shell enhancement to provide a better UI layer over Windows 7 hurts.

Hat Tip: Tom Warren at Winrumors

The debacle’ of Windows Vista and the proliferation of quality Web applications had Microsoft on a sticky wicket couple of years back. Critics, and even a section of fans, wondered if Microsoft could pull off a winner in Windows 7 against the negative sentiments and the overt Apple hype and if Microsoft was doing a wise thing investing in desktop applications in the age of online productivity suites.

Well the obituary writers were clearly wrong if the numbers are any testimony. Great reviews by both consumers and businesses followed the launch of Windows 7 in October 2009, and today at the annual Worldwide Partner Conference in Los Angeles, Steve Ballmer announced that more than 400 million Windows 7 licenses have been sold in less than two years. During the keynote, Ballmer also announced that Office 2010, shipped in June 2010, has sold over 100 million copies.

Microsoft Corp.’s annual Worldwide Partner Conference (WPC) is a four-day event that celebrates the accomplishments of the company’s global partners. Steve Ballmer delivered the keynote on the first day of the event today before nearly 15,000 partners from around the globe. You can find the recording of the keynote here.

Windows is arguably the heart of the Redmond company and   Windows and Office together have traditionally been major revenue-grossers for Microsoft in the consumer as well as enterprise market. A dent in this space would’ve hurt Microsoft’s overall ecosystem. In a rough sense, an enterprise not on Windows is most likely not a customer of any of the Microsoft’s slew of server and enterprise products.

The latest numbers reveal that Microsoft is still going strong with the old workhorses – in sales, if not in the mindshare. Windows 7 is the fastest-selling operating system in history and according to a previous statement by Microsoft, 7 copies of Windows 7 sold every second. According to Net Applications, Windows 7 is now running on 27.13% of all PCs worldwide as of June 2011. Office 2010 is also the fastest-selling version of Office in history.

Although Android holds the No. 1 position and sits on top of the smartphone market, the battle for the second position between Apple and Blackberry got tougher and in the end it was Apple who made it, leaving behind RIM’s BlackBerry in the third position.

According to the report published by market research firm comScore, Android continues to dominate the smartphone world while Apple’s iOS ranks No. 2 and BlackBerry dropping to the third position followed by Microsoft’s Windows 7 at fourth position.

The reason behind Blackberry’s backsliding could be due to the delay in release of new models and the several problems faced by the company.  RIM is currently valued at about $14 billion which came down from $83 billion in June 2008.

RIM’s Blackberry OS has 24.7 percent in the the smartphone market share while Apple’s iOS now enjoys 26.6 percent share whereas Google’s Android OS saw a 5.1 percent rise making its total share 38.1 percent and topping the list.

During the three month average period ending in May 2011, Android and iOS were the only two platforms that saw growth of 5.1 percent and 1.4 percent respectively. Blackberry lost 4.2 percent while Microsoft losing 1.9 percent and Palm losing 0.4 percent share in the US market.

The report also mentioned that Apple saw a significant growth in hardware sales, and rose from 7.5 percent to 8.7 percent. However, Samsung retained it’s position at the top with 24.8 percent restricting LG to second position with 20.9 percent. Motorola, on the other hand, had a slight decline of 1 percent, yet holding it’s position at three.

The research also dug up the mobile content usage by subscribers. It was reported that subscribers most used text messaging (69.5 percent) on their mobile device with a 0.7 percent rise. Browsers on the other hand, were used by 39.8 percent of subscribers (1.5 percent rise) while 38.6 used downloaded apps.

Social  networking or reading blogs,  however, saw a 1.8 percent growth with 26.8 percent while others enjoyed playing games (26.9 percent) and listening to music (18.6  percent)

MSI is showing off a lot of new devices at Computex this year. We already posted about the WindPad Enjoy 7 and Enjoy 10 budget Android tablets, but they weren’t the only launches by MSI today.

MSI also unveiled two more tablets – the MSI WindPad 110W, a 10 inch Windows 7 tablet and the MSI WindPad 100A, a 10 inch Android tablet.

MSI WindPad 110W Windows 7 Tablet

The MSI WindPad 110W has a 10.1 inch IPS display with a resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels. It runs Windows 7 and is powered by the AMD Brazos processor with Radeon HD 6250 graphics. It has 2 GB RAM and offers a 64 GB SSD. Its battery lasts for over 6 hours and it has dual cameras. It weighs 850 gms and comes with Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n and USB ports.

MSI WindPad 100A Android Tablet

The MSI WindPad 100A has a 10.1 inch, 1280 x 800 pixel IP display as well. It is powered by a dual core ARM Cortex A9 processor and has 1 GB RAM. It will come with 32 GB internal storage and offers 8 hrs of battery life. It has a weight of 720 gms and comes with SD card support and USB ports. It will likely run Android 3.0/3.1 Honeycomb.

No pricing details have been revealed yet.

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Asus has just unveiled a new Eee PC netbook at the Computex the X101. The X101 is the first ever netbook to ship with MeeGo as its default operating system.

The netbook is powered by an Intel Atom N435 processor clocked at 1.33GHz. The X101 is insanely thin at only 17.6mm and weighs only 950g. It will pack a 10.1-inch display with a resolution of 1024×600.

ASUS evolves the Eee PC further with new models that take netbooks to ever-greater heights. The new Eee PC X101 has been designed from the start to be the perfect ultraportable for modern mobile users, with its Intel ® MeeGo operating system incorporating full support for a wide range of social networking services.

The X101 will also pack in 2 USB ports, a microSD card slot, Wi-Fi b/g/n, and Bluetooth. Asus will provide users with an option to replace the traditional hard disk with an SSD. The netbook is powered by a 2600mAh battery.

Asus will ship the X101 netbook in two variants one with Windows 7 as its default one, and the other one with MeeGo OS. The MeeGo model of the X101 is expected to cost around $200 only!

Sadly, Asus did not mention anything about the release date of the X101 netbook.