Get answers to these 7 frequently-asked-questions, courtesy of PCMag.com

Q: Will my 32-bit applications run if I’ve switched to the 64-bit variant of Windows 7?

Q: Can I install Windows 7 to a netbook with no DVD drive?

Q: What’s the difference between upgrade and full retail versions?

Q: What’s the difference between the Upgrade and Custom installation options?

Q: How can I qualify for the Student price of Windows 7? What about the OEM pricing?

Q: Can I change from one Vista Edition, say Home Premium, to another of Windows 7, say Professional?

Q: Clicking on a Quick Launch icon in Windows Vista would always launch a new instance of that app, even if one instance was already running. But in Windows 7, clicking on an icon you’ve pinned to the taskbar doesn’t do this. Can I replicate the Vista functionality?

The answers are found here.

Got a Windows XP tabletPC, netbook or desktop?  Wanna go fresh, clean and brand new to Windows 7?

Or running Windows Vista system, that you want to do a clean install of Win 7 ?

But why clean installs?

Because it clears out the old stuff and let you start afresh, faster, cleaner machine. None of the old registry, uninstalled program leftovers or junk/bloatware.

So check out this link on how you can do it, even try with the Upgrade versions of the OS.

Do remember to backup all your data/stuff before you try this!

Paul Thurrott’s SuperSite for Windows: Clean Install Windows 7 with Upgrade Media.

The Nokia Internet Tablet, started with a simple idea with the n770 back in 2006. So as the path grows, n800, n810 and now the n900.

I personally feel it cannot be called a Internet tablet anymore, since it’s really a phone, a smartphone at that.

These days, it isn’t a real smart phone, unless you can surf the net, watch movies, listen to music, has a gps, emails and more thrown in.

So anyways, if you are looking at upgrading to the n900, go ahead to check out this post to give you a clear idea of how it compares to your current n810.

Nokia N900 Photo Gallery And N810 Comparison.

Have loads of digital photos, even videos? You organised them by albums, dates or events?

Now with the free Google Picasa 3.5, you can organize your photos by people using the facial recognition!

I have been using Picasa since Google bought and offered it free to all. It’s a really easy to use and great way to quickly import in photos from my digital camera, do quick fixes or even some simple effects (b/w, soft focus..).

The great list of features, include doing slide shows, photo colleges, exporting easily to other sizes and emailing or sharing via Picasa web Albums.

And quite importantly, all the photo editing, is non-destructive. Which means my original photos are as they are, in the best quality and only what I export has the new changes. So I can play as many different ideas as I want.

Did I mention it can also do video from version 3? Yup, it can do simple cuts and convert them for you to upload directly to Youtube.com!

And with Picasa version 3.5, there’s facial recognition, to allow you to face tag your family and friends’ photos.

Download Picasa 3.5 from here.

Comex Gem found – Want a cheap SGD$559, Green (low power = 40W only!) yet powerful video viewing small desktop or nettop as this is known?

Check out this AsRock Ion 330!

The price doesn’t come with an OS but you can install Windows 7 RC for free till you decide or run Linux on it.

It even features a very fast 4-10secs Instant boot! Has HDMI/DVI output + VGA.

Although running on Intel’s Atom chip (its the newer dual core 330 with dual channel DDR RAM = basically means almost double of what you are getting on the netbooks these days) , it’s graphics is provided by the new Nvida’s ION chipset which can handle Blu-ray and graphics up to the full HD 1080p!

Here’s more information and a detailed review from TweakTown!

ASRock ION 330-BD Nettop – Affordable, Overclockable and 1080p HD Introduction :: TweakTown.

And here’s the brochure on where to find it at Comex 2009.

Thinking of buy the latest Atom netbook or a new laptop or notebook or even a Dell or HP desktop?

If you can wait, WAIT because even with Comex giving great bargains, there are good reasons NOT to buy your computers this computer IT fair.. wait for Sitex its the 3rd week of  November 2009..

Seriously guys.. its just 2 months.. And you save yourself the pain of reinstalling Windows 7.

From Gizmodo : Stop! 5 Reasons to Wait on Buying That Laptop – Notebooks – Gizmodo.

Comex 2009 Pricelists and Floor plan!

It’s here again, the madness, the ‘what-recession?’ record breaking sales and people attending Singapore’s newest computer and IT fair at Suntec is here. From 10-13 September 2009, 12pm-9pm daily.

The latest discounts from Canon, Dell, Fujifilm, Asus, HP, Sony, Apple, Creative, Samsung, Acer, Seagate, Hitachi, Nikon, Toshiba, Epson, Linksys, Dlink, Sharp and more!

Here is the complete pricelists/brochures, courtersy of Hardwarezone.com

COMEX 2009.

There have been lots of mock ups circulating  around the net.. here are some of the better ones.

So when Nowhereelse.fr posted their pictures, it looks the most possible one of the lot. A nice 10 inch screen and the iphone/ipod touch look a-like button.

Rumours have it that the Apple tablet may act as a secondary display device or even as a Wacom type tablet for you to draw/use while connecting to your main Mac/PC ? [Actually there are programs out there that allow you to do this now. So it's not that difficult.. well, at least on the Windows platform!)

So here's what I hope the tabletPC like device would be...

1. Everything the iPod touch can do (Apps,games, photos/videos... of course music!)
2. Wifi enable (of course!)
3. Bluetooth enabled with  support for tethered modem usage and wireless music stream A2DP!
4. Read eBooks - PDF !!
5. at least 5 hours of battery life
6. Priced at USD$600 not more than US$800! -> with today's exchange rates it's about SGD$1000...

We’ll only know… when Apple takes on the TabletPC/Netbook market later this year, with their release of their.. Mac Book Touch? iPad? iTablet?…. (whatever!) haha

In fact this is my 2nd set of the headphones as the first one had the same problem, after a period of use (even though I do clean it, most of the times..) the buttons fail to work.

You see the buttons that connect to the ear speakers, are cleverly designed to allow you to forward/rewind tracks, pause/play, increase/decrease volume and even answer or hang up calls without going to your ipod/zen/mobile or any bluetooth music device.

These buttons are just a quick touch so you never have to take out your music device, in my case I use my Nokia e51 to play back music. This is very useful when you’re running and you don’t have to fumble with cables OR the music device.

However, after about 6-8 months… the bottom row of buttons stop responding totally. Usually you will hear a click sound, to know the function is activated, but no more. So I lost the control to Backtrack, and decreasing the volume. I get around this by having a playlist and doing the volume control on my e51.

Today I did my 10km run and, for some unknown reason (could be the pairing) the music just keeps going off after a while. While the headset is fully charged, so I had to turn off and on the headset so that the music will play for again…. for a while

And even worse, could be a button fault.. sometimes there’s a constant beeping that interrupts the music…Sigh.

I thought of getting a replacement the new Motorola S9-HD, which is the supposedly improved version of the first generation S9.. but from what I read from the online reviews, even though the music quality has improved a lot… the sweat problem has not been solved.

Hey Moto, if you happen to read this, the S9 is a great product with real good design and much thought put into it… But please solve the sweat problem!

Guess, I’ll be looking for another pair of ear phones to run with soon. Need to train for my 21km…