Adobe Flash Player 10.1 Improves Netbook HD Video
Video can be choppy on older netbooks, especially if you’re bold enough to try for full-screen HD Flash video. However, Adobe’s new Flash Player 10.1 with GPU acceleration, now in beta, has been proven to crank video quality on machines with slimmed down processors.
Flash Player 10.1 even draws upon the power of Nvidia or ATI graphics cards in order to decode video from YouTube or Hulu, so if you dropped cash on more powerful graphics your money won’t go to waste.
PCWorld set up an interesting side-by-side comparison of Flash 10.1 video quality using both IE and Firefox. You should check it out.
Quartics Qvu Brings Netbooks and Notebooks “Beyond HD”
Quartics, Inc. is announcing a new solution designed to improve movies, gaming, and media streaming on netbooks and laptops. It’s called Qvu, and it’s designed to deliver video quality that’s “Beyond HD” while conserving power use.
Qvu is also designed to bring non-HD content up to near-HD levels. It’s already been picked up by a number of OEMs including Acer.
Most netbooks don’t have the hardware to rock HD video, but Qvu means to solve that problem, according to Quartics executive VP Derek Meyer:
“Consumers have raised the bar on the experience they want with video content. Qvu is the only solution to be created with this goal in mind. Any Netbook or Laptop enabled with Qvu will be unique in its ability to provide true enjoyment through incredible video realism and detail like never before.”
Forward Concepts president Will Strauss piped in with his own summary of Qvu:
“Netbooks are one of the hottest new product categories. But they have lacked an ability to deliver an immersive video experience – until now. Solutions such as Qvu from Quartics help fulfill the promise of Netbooks and other portable products as a dynamic platform for the consumption of video from any source. This can only increase their appeal to consumers, and holds the potential to further grow Netbook and ultraportable device markets.”
It will be incredibly exciting to see where this new technology goes and to see how it is implemented in netbooks.
Mobinnova Beam Netbook Supports HD Video And Godly Battery Life
Smartbook maker Mobinnova is working on an 8.9″ netbook lookalike called the Beam. It runs Windows CE, leading us to believe it’s a bit of an underachiever, but unexpectedly supports HD video and runs the Nvidia Tegra chipset.
The netbook/smartbook/whatever will be launched by a carrier like Verizon, who will subsidize its cost. Mobinnova says it won’t come with an app store but downloadable apps and games may be available upon it’s release. I’m frankly not quite sure what the difference is.
The beam also supports GPS but won’t come with a navigation application. Furthermore, the netbook is said to be capable of “ HD playing for 5 to 10 hours, or up to 24 hours of continuous music playback.” Whoa.
It’s expected by January 2010, so keep your eyes peeled for updates by then.
Broadcom Plans Netbook Device
Chip maker Broadcom, known for its communication technologies, recently launched their new tool for enabling HD video on netbooks – the Broadcom Crystal HD Enhanced Media Accelerator.
The company may have also licensed ARM Cortex A9 multicore processor technology in order to implement the Media Accelerator. If their chips are widely implemented in netbooks or MIDs the results could be devices with stronger, cheaper media capabilities.
The fact that the Broadcom Enhanced Media Accelerator is based on ARM architecture means we can also expect it to use less energy than products from Intel, VIA, or AMD. However, most major Windows OSes won’t work on ARM devices.
A List of Hi-Resolution Netbooks
Many consumers interested in netbooks are turned off by the price tags of their heftier notebook brethren but can’t quite commit to making the switch to a netbook because of resolution issues. What issues, do you ask? Way too many netbooks top out at 1024 x 600 pixels, which isn’t much to work with when you want to watch a movie or play games. So what’s to be done?
Jaganath.com has put together a useful list of netbooks with high resolution, which might be a godsend if you’re in the market.
You can check it out here, but if you’re interested in a little more detail about each of the netbooks in question, feel free to browse some of our articles below.
