DataWind’s Aakash tablet sold out; UbiSlate 7 up for pre-orders

It’s been less than a week since the Aakash tablet was released online, and DataWind has already sold out what is touted as the world’s cheapest tablet. However, the company highlights that its UbiSlate 7, the upgraded version of the Aakash tablet, is still available for pre-booking. It’s notable that the UbiSlate 7, priced at Rs. 2,999, is scheduled to be launched in January next year.

The overwhelming response to the Aakash tablet was very much expected. The tablet, priced at Rs. 2,500, comes with a monthly data plan of Rs. 98. Read more details about the device in Your guide to the new $35 Aakash Tablet.The UbiSlate 7 gives you an upgraded operating system and battery life. Also, you get the Wi-Fi and 3G, with its SIM functionality also extending to voice calls. The UbiSlate 7 costs you just Rs. 499 more than the Aakash.

 

Considering the massive response to the Aakash, we’re expecting similar response to the UbiSlate 7 when it is launched next month. Meanwhile, DataWind has not provided any information when the Aakash will be available again or when the tablet will hit the retail shelves.

The  Aakash tablet,The ultra low-cost tablet is priced at Rs. 2,500, and comes with a delivery time of seven days. The Aakash tablet, previously nicknamed as Sakshat and touted as world’s cheapest tablet, is aimed at students and can be used for various functions. The 7-inch tablet however, has already been criticised for its slower processor and minimal features, especially when compared to the better-specced Aakash 2, which is due to be launched in January.

Perhaps DataWind, the maker of Aakash, aims to address its limitations with the launch of the Aakash 2, which for now is officially being called the UbiSlate 7 tablet, and has been priced at Rs. 2,999. DataWind has already started accepting pre-orders for the UbiSlate 7.

Both devices are expected to change current market dynamics, as they are already being pitted against other budget tablets in the market such as Reliance 3G Tab and Beetel Magiq.

The UbiSlate 7, or Aakash 2 as it might end up being called, costs marginally more than the Aakash, and offers better specs. Most importantly, you will not have to wait for long to lay hands on this. Therefore, will be much wiser to wait for another few weeks, and then lay hands on a better tablet. Let us compare the two tablets to understand just why the Ubislate 7 is a better choice:

Aakash Tablet:

The Aakash tablet runs on Android 2.2 Froyo operating system and is powered by a ARM11 – 366MHz processor. The tablet has a seven-inch resistive touch display with 800×480 pixels resolution. It has 256MB of RAM. The device supports the following document formats: DOC, DOCX, PPT, PPTX, XLS, XLSX, ODT, ODP, and can also run a PDF viewer and text editor. It has a 2,100 mAh battery which is rated to deliver up to 3 hours of backup, depending upon usage.

Price: Rs. 2,500

UbiSlate 7:

DataWind has not given detailed information about the UbiSlate 7 apart from the features that have been upgraded. The UbiSlate 7 runs on Android 2.3 Gingerbread operating system and is powered by a Cortex A8 – 700 MHz processor. The tablet has a 3,200 mAh battery, which is likely to give a better backup than the Aakash. While the Aakash was restricted to the Wi-Fi network, the UbiSlate 7 supports Wi-Fi and 3G, with its SIM functionality also extending to voice calls. “This tab is made for the requirement of the users and especially for student needs,” DataWind quotes on its website.

 

FacebookTimeline

  • FacebookTimeline

Social networking site Facebook’s latest service Timeline has been globally rolled out. The company said Timeline had so far been available only to a few people, but now it had made it available to everybody.

Timeline was announced by Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg at the f8 conference in September. Here’s all you need to know about Facebook Timeline.

  • What is Timeline

Timeline allows users to compile and let others see everything they have shared so far, from photos, stories to shared videos and music. Some of the things a user can do on Timeline are: edit his basic info, jump to the past, view his activity log, check highlights from each month, star stories he wants to highlight, add life events, update his status, view and add photos and share his app activity.

  • How it is different from your current profile
 Presently, only latest pictures or posts of users are visible, while large part of the previous posts are hidden. The only way to retrieve them is to scroll down and click on “More Stories”. Timeline on the other hand retains a user’s older posts, photos etc and also groups them datewise making it easy and convenient for viewing.
  • Activating Timeline:

To get timeline, a user needs to simply go to the Introducing Timeline page and click on ‘Get It Now’. Or he can wait till he receives an announcement at the top of his profile.

  • How it works

Once a user upgrades to Timeline, he will get seven days to review everything that appears on his Timeline before anyone else can see it. You can also choose to publish your timeline at any time during the review period.

If a user decides to wait, his Timeline will automatically go live after seven days. His new timeline will replace his profile, however, all his stories and photos will remain there.

Users who want to see how their Timeline would appear to other people, can click on the ‘gear menu’ at the top of their Timeline, and select “View As.” This shows them how their Timeline will appear to a specific friend or public.

  • Friends List

For those who always keep their Friends List private, Timeline is a curse as it prominently displays just how ‘popular’ you are on Facebook and who all are connected with you.

There is no apparent way to turn it off, unlike earlier settings. This may be a major put-off for those who do not want to share their Friends List with all and sundry for various reasons.

Timeline puts your life out in the open like never before. Unlike the earlier single webpage design where older content – shares, status updates, notes, likes, comments, photos and notes – kept getting buried under labyrinths of time, Timeline’s scrapbook interface has now given an excellent tool to people to datamine others’ Facebook.This may not be such a great news for those not keen on sharing each and everything from their life with everyone. So before rushing to Publish your Timeline, it is advisable to spend hours and hours reviewing what content you don’t want to share, and delete or remove from Timeline. You get a week before Timeline will automatically go live on December 23, even if you decide not to publish.

  • Activity Log

Activity Log is a place where users can review all their posts and activity, from today back to when they first started using Facebook. Only users will be able to see their activity log.

A user will be able to see two dropdown menus next to each story in their activity log. The first is to see and adjust the privacy of a post. The second one is to allow a user to decide if he actually wants a post to appear on his timeline. Users can feature, hide or delete any of their posts.

As for how to find a certain story, post or photo, all a user needs to do is click the “All” dropdown at the top of his activity log and select what he is looking for.

Apart from making Timeline available on Web, Facebook has also launched Timeline on Android and m.facebook.com.
  • Timeline on my mobile

Mobile timeline starts with a user’s unique cover photo. As a user scrolls down, he will see his posts, photos and life events as they happened. Photo albums and other posts are horizontally swipeable, so that one can view multiple photos or posts inline without leaving timeline. A user can also swipe through the views at the top of his timeline to navigate to your map, photos, subscribers and more.

PREVIEW OF TIMELINE:

Scientists achieve 186Gbps transfer rate across standard fiber optic line

Heralding a practical new way to transfer data at unprecedented speeds, scientists from Caltech and the University of Victoria have achieved a sustained data transfer rate between computers of 186Gbps, across a standard, commercially available fibre optic line. Real world applications for such speeds already exist, with many scientific projects across the world needing to share petabytes of data with other institutions.

The team of researchers consisted of scientists from various fields, including high-energy physics, computer science, and engineering. The 186Gbps transfer rate (98Gbps in one direction, 88Gbps in the other) was achieved over a 100Gbps bidirectional fibre optic line that stretched 217km from the SuperComputing 2011 (SC11) convention in Seattle, to the University of Victoria Computer Centre in Canada.

While speeds of more than a 100Tbps have been achieved in the past, they have either been inordinately expensive, or done over specialized networks. Also, the team from Caltech and the University of Victoria transferred data from computer to computer, quite different from just a demonstration of speed

 

The Caltech team at SC11 used 13 servers and 40Gbps LAN connections, while University of Victoria team used 10 servers and 10Gbps LAN connections to achieve the two computer-to-computer data transfer rate records, which were sustained for 11 hours each.

The first record, the 186Gbps data transfer rate (~23.25GBps) was achieved in a memory-to-memory transfer, while the second, 60Gbps (~7.5GBps) was achieved in a disk-to-disk transfer.

Refer to the Caltech SuperComputing 2011 site for more details about the equipment used in the record-breaking attempt, as well as the Caltech press release. Also, check out the rather excitedly narrated video below, demonstrating the team’s efforts:
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