Geekly Update - 04 November 2010

The AskBobRankin Geekly Update

China claims that it now has the world's fastest computer, the Tianhe-1, capable of 2.507 petaflops, the equivalent of 2,507 trillion calculations per second. This beats the USA's Cray XT5 Jaguar that works at 1.75 petaflops per second. Yes, but how fast can you type?

A report from ABI Research claims that during 2010 about 6 billion mobile apps will be downloaded, up from 2.4 billion last year. Unfortunately, the report doesn't state the market share of fart apps.

Amazon announced that they will soon be offering a sharing plan for Kindle owners, allow them to "loan" an ebook to a friend for 14 days.

Amazon also launched Audible this week, a service with over 75,000 audio books for Apple iPod and MP3 player owners. After a 30 free trial of its AudibleListener Gold, $14.95 a month gives you a free download every month.

Can't afford an iPad? Walgreens has an inexpensive solution and now carries the Maylong Middie Universe Tablet. Powered by Android, it has a 7" LCD color touchscreen and full browsing ability at a price of a mere $99.00.

Windows 7 celebrated its one year birthday Oct. 22. Microsoft says that it has sold 240 million licenses, a record for one of their operating systems, and adds that 93% of new PCs sold run the OS.

Geared for business folk, Hewlett Packard has declared that its new tablet will be available for $799.00. The wireless HP Slate 500 has an 8.9" WSVGA multitouch display, 2GB RAM, VGA camera and a 64GB SSD/SD card reader.

Either in spite of or because of the country's conflicts with Google mapping, China has launched its own online mapping service that can be viewed in 3D with a plug-in. Mapworld took 4 years to create by the country's State Bureau of Surveying and Mapping and features satellite images that can only be accessed by companies with a license.

Barnes & Noble is releasing the nook Color, an e-reader powered by Android with a 7" screen. The e-reader can browse and integrate with apps like Facebook and Twitter at a price of $249.00.

Those who happen to be on top of the world (the base camp of Mt. Everest,) can now find out what is going on below. Nepal's TeliaSonera and Ncell have launched 3G services that will help mountain climbers make calls, send video clips and email less expensively than by satellite technology.