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Whatever Happened to Netbooks?

August 9th, 2012

Netbooks were set to take over the world just a few years ago. Optimized for social media and web surfing, these smaller, lighter offerings flooded the market, especially Europe. Now no one even uses the word, much less the (original) devices. What happened, and what can we learn from it? Let’s take a look.

What’s in a name?

With the introduction of the Asus Eee PC in 2007, the term “netbook” gained currency. Acer Aspire models were also popular, due in no small part to the ease with which one could install OS X on them (and pretend to own a MacBook). Then, after a couple of roller coaster years, netbooks started losing that “cool” factor. And when CRE stocked its first iPad rental in 2010, it signaled the end of the upward curve for netbooks. By mid-2011 the netbook craze was over.

After being trumpeted as the most significant computer innovation since the trackpad (maybe the Magic Trackpad?), the netbook was finally seen for what it was – an inexpensive mini-laptop with no optical drive. With most keyboards too small for serious work and the CPUs generally underwhelming, the traveling professionals that were field-testing them finally gave up. It made more sense to buy or rent laptops with desktop-level power, since a new generation of potent CPUs was beginning to provide it.

Cupertino category killers

A two-round volley from Apple put the final kibosh on netbooks. First, in 2010 the iPad immediately captured the entire world’s imagination (like iOS 6 and the iPhone 5 are doing now, before they’re even released). If you just needed a tool for browsing, e-mail and buying the occasional widget, you could now do so with the iPad – along with a slew of other handheld devices, smart phones and tablet PC rentals. With both Apple and Android devices now flooding the market, there is no reason to maintain an artificial product category like “netbook.”

The second move from Apple was the repositioning of the MacBook Air. Initially underpowered and under-loved, the model had been around a short time when Apple gave it that 11-inch screen. Diminutive and super light, the upgraded Air sported a full-sized keyboard while its souped-up components made it a true desktop-replacement machine.

If you don’t want to use a Mac, the “Ultrabook” form factor is the Next Big Thing in PC laptops. With proper CPUs, generous helpings of RAM, huge amounts of SSD storage and full-size keyboards, connectors, ports and plugs, Ultrabooks are real computers ready for real work. To summarize: “Netbook” is dead, “Ultrabook” is ascendant – and we’ll keep you posted on what comes next!

CRE Account Executives can recommend the appropriate PC desktop computer rental for your expanded telemarketing project, as well as processing and storage technology for post-production work. One call or e-mail, or a trip to our Quick Rental Quote page, is all it takes!

Mountain Lion Pounces: OS X 10.8 Is Here

July 31st, 2012

Last week, Apple released its first computer operating system without “Mac” or “Macintosh” in the name: OS X 10.8, with the cute kitty code-name of Mountain Lion. It is available only by direct App Store download and only to users with either of the last two OS versions installed (10.6 or 10.7, Snow Leopard and Lion, respectively). Should you upgrade? Should you specify OS X 10.8 when you rent Macbook Pro laptops?

Let’s take a look at Mountain Lion…

When Apple introduced Lion in 2011, almost six of every 10 Mac owners passed on converting to Lion completely, including many a high-end user like those that rely on a CRE Mac Pro rental. Oddly, as Mountain Lion now appears to deliver on its predecessor’s promises, it’s not quite living up to its own pre-launch hype. Apple hasn’t made its intentions clear about the future of OS X, and the company’s reticence promotes FUD (Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt), as well as occasional bad reviews. What gives?

New dividing line?

Apple has upset a number of its most loyal customers by dumbing down Final Cut Studio and letting the Mac Pro go stale over the last several years. High-end users feel abandoned (subject of an upcoming blog), and oppose the Mac’s “iOS-ification.” The sort of media pros that use AJA IO HD-level technology are not as concerned with look and feel as they are with brains and brawn.

For non-pro users, it’s all about “social networks,” despite Facebook integration being delayed until a fall update. When iOS 6 is released around the same time, a CRE iPad rental will integrate just as seamlessly with OS X devices as other “pads, pods ‘n’ phones.” In the meantime, other new Mountain Lion features push “Mac socialization” forward, like Messages, the Notifications service and system-wide iCloud support. This last feature is not as intuitive as it should be, and it is strange how hard Apple worked to make it invisible.

Mountain Lion features …lots to look at?

Apple claims “over 250″ new features, but this includes changing the typeface on some dialog boxes. Peruse that new features list carefully, as some features only work with select Macs, such as Power Nap that collects messages and updates while asleep. Right now it only works on two Air models and the Retina Display MacBook Pro. There’s a lot to go over, so we’re going to live with the new OS for a bit and report back to you with what we discover.

Here’s your first Mountain Lion heads-up: Coinciding with the release of OS X 10.8 was the launch of new Mac-specific malware. Go here to check it out and get the antidote (if you need it).

For everything from trade show convention rentals to high-end post-production technology, your solutions are a single call or e-mail away, right here at CRE. And if you know what you need, visit our Quick Rental Quote page and be done and gone in minutes.

5 Embarrassingly Wrong Tech Predictions

July 17th, 2012

For all our scientific progress, humans have a dismal record of predicting the future. There is not a scintilla of evidence for supernatural prognostication, despite people believing in so-called psychics like Sylvia Browne (a proven fraud). Of course, the scientists and skeptics that expose psychic charlatans are no better at making predictions than phony seers are – yet they continue trying.

When a bespectacled fellow in a lab coat speaks, many of us lower our intellectual guard. Scientists are intelligent – the moon landing! the paleo diet! the iMac! – so we may listen even when they hold forth on subjects beyond their expertise. There are no experts at predicting the future, which these five embarrassingly wrong tech predictions prove quite conclusively.

1. “There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home.” Ken Olson founded Digital Equipment Corp. (DEC), one of the first manufacturers of mainframe computers for government and industry. Asked about the home-use potential of the PC in 1977, when Apple and others already had minicomputers on the market, Olson may have shown a lack of imagination, but he had a lot of company.

2. “We will never make a 32-bit operating system.” Bill Gates said this in 1983 at the launch of MSX, a computing architecture that was going to take the world by storm. It didn’t. On the other hand, the latest three OS packages from Microsoft – Vista, Windows 7 and the upcoming Windows 8 – have both 32- and 64-bit versions, which are installed on a wide range of PC desktop computer rental units.

3. “There is practically no chance [that] space satellites will be used to provide better [communications] inside the United States.” In 1961, the FCC Commissioner – appropriately named T. Craven – announced this conclusion of an in-depth government study. Today, whether people buy tablets or rent laptops, they can connect to the world wirelessly because commercial communications satellites began blasting into orbit in 1965.

4. “There is not the slightest indication that nuclear energy will ever be obtainable.” Albert Einstein gave this gloomy prediction about nuclear power in 1932. As part of the Manhattan Project that built the atomic bomb, Einstein worked with ENIAC, the first “real” computer, which was less powerful than a 1980s-vintage Casio DataBank watch. A MacBook Pro rental would have seemed like alien technology to ol’ Albert.

5. “Nuclear-powered vacuum cleaners will probably be a reality in 10 years.” Alex Lewyt, a vacuum cleaner manufacturer, was thus quoted in a New York Times article in 1955. The early years of the Atomic Age were exciting (and scary). Today, render farm rentals from CRE comprise technological components so powerful and advanced that Mr. Lewyt just might have thought them nuclear-powered.

From the best trade show convention rentals to the top technology for post-production, CRE is your one-stop shop. Just call or e-mail an expert Account Executive. If you know what you need, head to our Quick Rental Quote page and be finished in no time!

Mac Pro: Say It Ain’t So!

June 19th, 2012

Apple made a number of announcements last week at its Worldwide Developers Conference, but the Mac Pro – the stylish aluminum tower that has always represented the ultimate in Macintosh computing power – got exactly zero stage time. After the show, an unnamed Apple exec contacted David Pogue, the New York Times tech columnist, and “announced” that the first Mac Pro upgrade in over two years was “under way.”

The big improvements? You can now get “slightly faster two-year-old CPUs,” griped Instapaper developer and longtime Mac partisan, Marco Armendt. He noted there were no top-of-the-line Xeon chips, no USB 3 and not even a Thunderbolt port, the very thing that media pros using render farms and other post-production gear need. The “new model” even has “the same two-year-old graphics cards [and] motherboard.” To Armendt, the message is quite clear: “Apple doesn’t give a —- about the Mac Pro.”

An Apple vet speaks

Andy Hertzfeld was a member of the original Macintosh development team whose influence can be seen all the way to today’s powerful iMac rental. He says he was “worried” when the Mac Pro wasn’t mentioned from the WWDC stage, but “was in for a shock” when he found the Apple tower “stuck in time in 2010.” Bottom line? “The only thing that’s still high-end about it,” Hertzfeld concludes, “is the bloated price.” (CRE has the fastest Mac Pros anywhere, set up right and ready to go – and rentals save you from big capital expenditures.)

Clearly, Apple’s management team believes that mobile iOS devices are the firm’s best bet for the future. Chris Foresman of Ars Technica observed at the end of 2011 that “the iOS ecosystem has come to represent 70% of Apple’s revenue.” At the same time, Apple has upgraded and added Thunderbolt ports to MacBook Pro rental and the rest of the Mac line – the mini has Thunderbolt and the Pro doesn’t? Some high-end users just might switch…how many will desert Apple for Windows or Linux?

Desktop computer dead?

It is bad business to “utterly disappoint your most loyal customers,” as Hertzfeld puts it. He ends with a couple of irritating questions: “Why do an update at all if you hardly change anything? What’s going on here?” As journalists attempted to clarify the situation after WWDC, Apple didn’t immediately respond. When the blowback built to a boiling point, however, that “unnamed executive” called the NYT‘s Pogue and began damage control. Some Apple watchers wonder if Apple thinks desktop computers have a future, since nothing was said at WWDC about the iMac, either. “An executive did assure me” about new models, says Foresman, “probably for release in 2013.” Okay, so we’ll keep you posted. Again.

CRE will keep you moving forward, too, with everything from event production rentals to post-production technology and mass storage. One call or e-mail, or a trip to our Quick Rental Quote form, gets it done. Call now!

Chrome 19: Best Browser Ever?

June 12th, 2012

Google’s Chrome Web browser just keeps getting better, with some pundits calling the recent release, Chrome 19, ”perfect.” Google has a Chrome Operating System (OS), too, but it has yet to make low-cost “Chromebooks” a viable replacement when you need to rent laptops that offer desktop-grade power. Chrome the web browser, on the other hand, is a huge international hit.

Chrome Browser

Chrome rules

Chrome rules now. As of May 2012, Chrome had 33% of the world browser market, inching past Internet Explorer (IE) in a big PR win for the California company. Microsoft had gotten quite used to being #1, while Apple is content to have browser share beyond its computer share (Safari is for Windows, too). Want your iMac rental outfitted with Chrome, IE, Safari or all three? Just ask.

Chrome 19’s most useful new feature is tab syncing. Chrome has always been a great “syncer” and now – in addition to apps, history, themes and other settings – you can sync your open tabs. This works with all your computers, from your home PC and office workstation to the MacBook Pro rental you got for that upcoming conference. Further, it will also work with any smart phone running on Android Ice Cream Sandwich with a copy of the Chrome beta release for Android. Warning: Don’t leave your work PC on with this feature engaged unless you want all your coworkers to see that you download Hannah Montana posters at home.

Privacy, security upgrades

Of course, Chrome has all the privacy tweaks you need. Head to the Options menu, then to the Under the Hood tab. From there you can control what goes on with cookies (now including Flash cookies), JavaScript, image displays, pop-ups, plug-ins and location data. This is definitely the browser to run if you are setting up a conference booth or breakout session and want to put live Internet on some plasma display rentals – the control is total and nearly glitch-free.

Some users reported trouble with Chrome 18, the last version, particularly under the Windows 7 OS (64-bit). Two different reviewers this past month decided to try duplicating the problems, which seem to occur when multiple tabs with heavy Flash requirements are open. On powerful systems, neither tester could cause a crash. Bottom line? “I can’t say that you won’t have problems with this new version of Chrome,” concluded one reviewer. “All I can say is that on my Windows 7 box, and on my various Linux and Mac boxes as well, Chrome 19 never faltered no matter how heavy a load I put on it.”

No matter how heavy a load is put on you, CRE is here to help. Whether you need trade show convention rentals or high-end post gear, help is always a single call or e-mail away. If you know what you need, visit our Quick Rental Quote page and be done in minutes!

Pros & Cons of the Top 5 Browsers

June 7th, 2012

There are literally hundreds (thousands?) of different web browsers that you can get from open-source apps to The Big Guns (Internet Explorer, Safari, Chrome, Firefox and Opera). Today we will bring you up-to-date on the pros and cons of the top web browsers to ensure that you know how to meet your web browsing needs.

In reviewing information from Tom’s Hardware, CNET.com and other sources, we found a solid consensus on the top five browsers. Here are the top five browsers:

Internet Explorer (current version 9) is notorious for not following standards. The famous “Destroyer of Netscape Navigator” has a huge installed base – it’s on our PC desktop computer rentals – but in one tech site’s “browser showdown”,IE finished dead last in over half the 20-odd tests. Its media tools are good with Silverlight excelling at interactive media, but one of the “showdown” judges said that IE’s overall results were “nothing less than sad.”

Opera (current version 12) was one of the first browsers, debuting in 1996. It is considered a RAM hog, but in test after test is a close second to Chrome in speed. Many creative pros, including CRE customers working with AJA IO HD and other potent technology, seem to gravitate to Opera, possibly due to the company culture (old hippies?).

Safari (current version 5.1.6) is not “the world’s fastest web browser.” Chrome is the true “speed champ” and Opera beats Safari, too. On iMac rental, Safari is tightly integrated into the OS, an advantage it loses when running on Windows – and which may have kept it out of first place. Overall, Safari is still behind Google – for now.

Firefox (current version 13) goes back to the 1990s and is an international presence. Although a test judge noted its “staggering number of customization options,” Firefox has somehow managed to lose its edge. Tablet PC rentals and touch devices make use of some of its custom strengths, but as a go-to browser, Firefox loses to all but IE.

Chrome (current version 19) is the undisputed winner of all the browser comparisons it has appeared in. In fact, Google’s browser has so very many unique, powerful features that it deserves its own blog. Look for that next time, on Tuesday, June 12th.

In the meantime, look to CRE when you need to impress a conference crowd with plasma display rentals or furnish an entire breakout room. Media professionals appreciate our huge inventory of Xserve RAID rentals, potent Mac towers and monstrous mass storage devices. One call or e-mail, or a short visit to our Quick Rental Quote page, and you’re back to work!

Boom Time for Software Subscriptions (SaaS)

May 24th, 2012

It started with “enterprise software” companies like Oracle and Microsoft offering ever-more-centralized control over a firm’s data, storage and workflows. Now Adobe Systems and other SaaS software makers are jumping on the bandwagon, too, giving startup firms and solo professionals some of the flexibility they need to compete with “the biggies.”

We’re talking about software subscriptions, a niche within a large new tech service category known as Software as a Service (SaaS). While some tech categories are dead (netbooks) or dying a slow death (fax machines), subscription software packages are booming. Let’s take a look.

Subscription software options = advantages

Reasons both economic and managerial can support choosing subscription software services over buying programs outright. Whether you’re running Microsoft Office on a PC desktop computer rental or a 3D design package on a top-rated Macintosh, you now have options you didn’t have just a few years ago.

Of course, even when you pay $1,000+ for Adobe Creative Suite, you don’t “own” the software. Rather, you have a license to use it, a “perpetual” one that lasts forever. The downside? It doesn’t matter if you’re using a PC, an iMac or a laptop – updates, upgrades and ongoing tech support are not free, and can be as much as 20-25% of the total cost of ownership (TCO).

Make your best subscription deal

With a subscription deal, you pay for a certain term (a month-to-month or year-long agreement) and can’t use the software if you don’t renew. For example, if you decide to rent laptops for your conference team, and need special software installed, the cost-effective way would be short-term subscriptions or other SaaS arrangement. For longer periods, cost effectiveness improves, as upgrades, support and repairs are all included in your recurring payments.

You will always need the latest version of the program(s) you and your firm rely on daily, so the subscription model is best if you have a tight budget. Like plasma display rentals from CRE, your software rental is always ready to work, will be replaced immediately if defective and is guaranteed to do the job. There does come a point at which a purchase makes sense, but this differs for everyone and the variables are quite numerous. Rely on your trusted number cruncher to advise you.

If your company needs a dozen tablet PCs, a breakout session setup or a range of trade show convention rentals, then CRE is where it’s at. Just call or e-mail an experienced Account Executive. Know what you need already? Visit our Quick Rental Quote form and you’ll be on your way in no time!

PC Desktop Computer Progress in 2012 – Part 1

May 15th, 2012

Apple scores the most headlines, but far more people in the world use Windows PCs than Macintoshes. 2011 brought speed increases for buyers of some new PC and Mac models, but progress by Intel was nearly canceled out by the flop of AMD’s so-called “Intel-killer” chip, nicknamed Bulldozer. Still, Intel helped the iMac achieve power rankings in Mac Pro territory with the latest, third-generation “Core-i” chips.

Ironically, now that a basic PC desktop computer rental can sport a high-end CPU – and since AMD is no competition – speed gains are no longer Intel’s “goal #1.” The newest Core i7, the fastest PC processor ever, is only marginally speedier than its predecessor. Even with two of its six cores turned off, it powers some iMacs past a Mac Pro rental in speed tests. That’s why Apple is reconsidering the future of its tower models (more in an upcoming blog).

What’s coming in 2012?

The modest progress in CPU power was widely expected, but so too were advances in graphics processors – and Android tablets were going to take over the world at $99, remember? For 2012, the following developments seem likely:

• CPUs will take a back seat to GPUs (Graphics Processor Units);

• Android tablet makers will finally field a worthy competitor to the mighty iPad rental; and

• light, thin laptops from numerous makers – with SSDs (Solid State Drives) – will try to knock off the “original Ultrabook,” the MacBook Air.

The CPU/GPU scene

There won’t be a big increase in core count or clock speed in 2012, with the former number maxing out at four (“quad-core”) and the latter at 3.5GHz (3.9 with Turbo). But potent integrated graphics means speedy encoding times, and images will get to plasma display rentals or other high-end monitors with greater speed, resolution and clarity.

Summarizing PC hardware trends for 2012, we expect to see:

• the race for the fastest PC chip to slow down, as Intel’s Core i7 outperforms the competition even with two of six cores turned off;

• graphics performance to make gains in 2012, meaning Apple Cinema Display rentals will look better, react faster, reproduce color more accurately and use less electricity; and

• the new Ultrabook form factor to pack desktop power into an under-two-pound, half-inch thick form factor. (If you want to see the future now, check out the Asus Zenbook. More on Ultrabooks in Part 2.)

At CRE, we serve experts in post-production who need render farms and other high-end gear, just as we serve marketing managers who need trade show convention rentals. If you know what you need, use our Quick Rental Quote form. But if you need help to overcome today’s bottlenecks – and prepare for tomorrow’s – then one call or e-mail puts you in touch with an expert Account Executive. Just let us know how can we help!

Watch for PC Progress in 2012, Part 2 on Thursday, May 17th.

Windows 8 Breaking News

May 1st, 2012

Microsoft has gradually taken the wraps off Windows 8, the most recent version of its flagship operating system (OS). Windows 8 is the first “MS OS” to be developed from the ground up for multiple devices – your laptop, that PC desktop computer rental, various tablets, big-name smart phones and who knows what else down the line (your refrigerator?). You can get a preview version of the OS online and use it until the final product is released late this year.

Microsoft “spokesfolks” describe the current pre-release version of Windows 8 as “a work in progress [that] will change before the final release,” advising those who install the trial to expect “hiccups and bugs.” Companies that distribute “beta” and “consumer preview” releases count on getting a lot of feedback – via user forums, blog posts and telemetry – for refining the final product. There is a little feedback trickling in, and it is cautiously optimistic. Let’s check it out.

Microsoft Windows 8

OS mash-up?

Windows 8 strikes some as a “crazy quilt combo” of the iPad, classic desktop Windows, Windows Phone and Microsoft’s Metro interface. The tile layout is meant to appeal to folks that have adopted and adapted to the uncluttered interface of the latest smart phones and iPad rental. The Redmond firm clearly wants this new, growing generation of multi-device users to see Windows 8 as a common interface.

That common interface comes in three versions. The newest member of the family is Windows RT, optimized for use on a tablet or all-in-one multitouch display PC with such “touch-optimized” software as OneNote, Word, Excel and PowerPoint. With a lean, clean interface and excellent battery-power management, Windows RT is what you’ll run on your new ARM-powered tablet.

Not your Daddy’s Windows OS

The standard package, Windows 8, is headed for most people’s laptops and desktops as the successor to Windows 7, with Internet Explorer 10, built-in access to the new Windows Store and all the flexibility most users need. Windows 8 Pro, for serious business users and geeks, ups the ante with virtualization, encryption, network management and domain connectivity. Finally, Windows Media Center – with expanded capabilities for controlling external devices like A/V (audio visual) equipment rentals – is a simple “media pack” add-on to Windows 8 Pro.

This isn’t your Daddy’s (or Mommy’s) Windows OS. Windows 8 was developed to combine standard desktop components with new-fangled elements from the parallel world of pads, tablet PC rentals and phones. Tiles, finger swipes, icons and apps, the touch-driven interface – these are among the new threads that tie everything together in Windows 8. Microsoft execs have not announced a precise release date for Windows 8, but they’re smart, so expect it in the fall, right on time for holiday shopping.

CRE is always right on time, too, with everything from event production rentals to special, high-powered post-production technology like render farms and mass storage. One call or e-mail, or a trip to our Quick Rental Quote form, gets it all going! Call now!

Top Security Threats in 2012, Part 2 of 2

April 12th, 2012

In Top Security Threats in 2012, Part 1 of 2, we discussed the increasing number of targeted attacks on websites and servers in 2011. Today’s, lets focus on social media threats and mobile mayhem.

Social media scams

Social media is among the primary means by which consumers and businesses communicate, do business, interact and share on the Internet. This makes social sites virtual magnets for criminal types. When the original iMac debuted, makers of cheap PCs immediately copied the colorful design to capitalize on Apple’s resurgence. In the same way, much of the current crop of malicious spam mimics the “look and feel” of such leading social networking sites as LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and, increasingly, Google+.

Scams on Facebook, in particular, spread by “likejacking,” where people are fooled into “liking” a page to make their Facebook walls available to the scammer for posting ads, porn promos or who-knows-what. Facebook alone will have over a billion users before long, logging on with phones, laptops, tablet PC rentals, game consoles and as-yet-unimagined wireless doodads. Despite ongoing improvements in security measures, the concentration of users and data on a handful of sites makes an irresistible target. Expect more of the same scams, along with some new ones, in 2012.

Mobile mayhem

With social media such an inviting target, malware targeting social media will increase, especially as millions more people buy tablets, rent laptops or log on to social media from even the cheapest cell phones. In addition to stealing data, malware can also track a device’s location, a serious new risk to child safety. And personal photos on most devices get stamped with the time as well as GPS coordinates of where the picture was taken, revealing more than you may wish to share.

The primary concern with mobile malware is the vulnerability, as well as the technical ignorance, of average users. In most companies, PCs are maintained by an IT department (one person or 100, depending on the size of the firm) that handles everything from operations and upgrades to networks and security. But if employees use their own mobile devices to access, use and store corporate data, some security teams may not even know. Companies must expand their security policies to control access to company networks by mobile devices. This may just be the most serious security threat for the year ahead.

If the year ahead holds production and/or post-production challenges for your firm, CRE can help you strategize just the right solutions from our industry-leading inventory of render farms, mass storage and other specialized gear. Plus, our rental equipment is tested to ensure security threats are eliminated. One call or e-mail, or a visit to the Quick Rental Quote page, is all it takes!

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