VAR Panchayat

Still Young & Vibrant at 30, COMPUTEX

by VARINDIA 2010-07-01

Innovations were recognized and honoured:

The design & innovation (d&i) awards 2010 jury singled out 34 products from a total of 181 entries for this important honour.TAITRA (the Taiwan External Trade Development Council), organizer of the COMPUTEX TAIPEI 2010, and iF International Forum Design jointly introduced the winners of the COMPUTEX TAIPEI d&i awards at the opening ceremony. Around 34 products were awarded, and 4 gold medal winners selected for their innovations and high quality.

The Gold Medal winning products were developed by the Taiwan-based IT manufacturers, including the Acer 8943G Consumer

Notebook from Acer Inc., aim USB Tube Delight Audio from Formosa 21 Inc., i-Phantom Amplifier and Soundyou Alu Sound System from Add-On Technology Co., Ltd. Other companies that were considered at this year's d&i awards included EVERCOOL

Thermal Corp. Ltd., Argox Information Co., Ltd., ATEN INTERNATIONAL CO, LTD., Thermaltake Technolgoy Co., Ltd., Micro Star Intel Co. Ltd., SINOX Company Ltd., FRUITSHOP International Corp, Ltd., Apacer Technology Inc., etc. Asus’3D Notebook got the biggest of all Best Choice Awards out of the 27 awards given this year.

Buzzwords at COMPUTEX 2010

Convergence was the key word there. This new look show, good to its slogan of “Shaping the Future!”, highlighted every facet of the

industry to assimilate the trends that converged in Taiwan. The main theme “products” included everything from 3D and E-reading to Tablet PC and Cloud computing and a myriad of products in between.

* 3D in the scene

A string of 3D products such as 3D notebooks, 3D digital frames, 3D All-In-One (AIO) PC, 3D high-definition cameras, 3D digital signage were spotted here with cutting-edge technologies. Big names like Acer, Asus and MSI displayed their latest high-end 3D AIO PCs and Notebooks models, many of which came with touch-panel functions.

Not only this, companies like Chimei paraded its 23.6-inch 3D monitor and 46-inch 3D TV panel. Chunghwa Picture Tube showcased its Shutter Glasses 3D monitor, Single-View and Multi-View naked-eye 3D monitors. And, Aiptek launched a series of 3D products from 3D high-definition camera to 3D digital frame and 3D webcam.

* Tablet PC and Touch Panels

After Asus pioneered the netbook trend at COMPUTEX TAIPEI in 2007 with its Eee PC, this year we saw the company showcasing its Eee Pad that joined a computer, a multi-media player and an E-book. Meanwhile, MSI has announced its multi-touch Tablet PC – MSI Wind Pad Tablet PC with its WindTouch user interface.

Touch-panel technology is growing by leaps and bounds with its single-touch, multi-touch, or hand-writing which is soon destined to be applied to vehicle GPS, TV set-ups, digital signages, and 3D gaming.

* E-reading

If Acer launched its LumiRead E-reader at this year’s COMPUTEX TAIPEI and aims at soon bringing out French and Italian models of E-books, Asus also announced its whole new Eee Tablet. It is a combination of an E-note and an E-book that targets students and business professionals. Delta which has long been a supplier in E-reading, this year used the event as a platform to introduce its 13'' colour E-magazine. This targets business professionals with such functions as handwriting, labelling and overview

* Going Cloud

With the wide use of smartphones, netbooks and many other mobile internet gadgets, Cloud-computing has also been one of the keywords in COMPUTEX TAIPEI 2010. Microsoft announced its Windows Embedded Compact 7 version ready for downloading; Google shared that its Chrome system dedicated to PCs would be in the market in Q4.

Biz match-making

This year, TAITRA arranged 2,014 one-on-one procurement match-making meetings on June 1 & 2 alone. These procurement meetings generated on-site business worth more than US$230 million, compared to the US$100 million created last year during these meetings.

Representatives from 116 top firms from 26 countries with annual sales exceeding US$50 million attended the procurement match-making meetings. Many of them were emerging markets: Turkey and UAE from the Middle East; Bulgaria, Poland, Romania, Russia, Turkey and Ukraine from Europe; Bangladesh, India from South Asia; Argentina and Chile from South America. The procurement by the companies from the emerging economies above totals US$38.8 million. Among the products that drew the most interest of the representatives were E-readers, 3D monitors, notebooks, servers and storage-related products.

A high-level government and industry IT Delegation from India comprising of representatives from the Union as well as State government ministries, besides senior industry dignitaries representing a cross-section of the electronics industry in India visited COMPUTEX 2010. The main objective of the Delegation was to explore the possibilities of cooperation between the IT industries of India and Taiwan, and promote Taiwanese investments in IT hardware manufacturing in India.

Many happy returns of the EVENT

COMPUTEX TAIPEI has become the largest computer exhibition in Asia and the second-largest in the world, next to CeBIT in Germany. Dr. Wang from TAITRA informed, “During the five days, the event welcomed more than 120,000 visitors in total from home and abroad to check out the latest products and technologies displayed in 4,861 booths used by 1,715 exhibitors.” Among the visitors were 35,017 international visitors from 216 countries. The top five countries/regions for international buyers were those from the USA, Japan, China, Hong Kong and South Korea.

First held in 1981, COMPUTEX TAIPEI celebrated its 30th birthday this year. With stellar performance this year, the show looks forward to another 30 years of progress to change the world and shape the future. To repeat the same success, TAITRA has again got busy to “Shape the future next May 31 to June 4, 2011 at COMPUTEX TAIPEI 2011!”

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Anand Chandrasekher
Sr. VP & GM - Ultra Mobility Group
Intel Corporation

Intel Corporation hosted a series of events to unveil and showcased its latest technology innovations, led by the Intel Atom processor, and including PC client and smart, connected devices, ultra mobility and embedded, cloud computing, wireless broadband, as well as software and applications at COMPUTEX Taipei.

In production now and on the shelves before the winter holiday season, mobile dual-core Intel, Atom processors will deliver a noticeably snappier, more responsive consumer experience in the same compact form factors, and with the same great battery life. Intel Atom processors N455 and N475 with DDR3 support for netbooks are available today and D525 and D425 for entry-level desktop PCs are expected to be available from June 21. Available to customers in early 2011, “Oak Trail” is optimized for sleek tablet and netbook designs, and will deliver up to a 50-per cent reduction in average power consumption with full HD-video playback and targeting software choice including MeeGo, Windows 7 and Google operating systems.

Vinay Shetty

Country Head – Component Business Group - India, ASUS Technology (P) Ltd.

ASUS’ constant efforts to be at the forefront of this cloud computing age has seen it introduce a stream of portable multimedia and productivity solutions that meet the needs of consumers. This year at COMPUTEX 2010, it proudly introduced a new range of diverse products that have been designed for this ever-changing computing landscape.

ASUS has combined the humble notepad and e-reader to give us the groundbreaking Eee Tablet. Designed with students and mobile business professionals in mind; it features everything they need to get through the day. With a 2,450 dpi touch resolution screen, the Eee Tablet is one of the world’s most accurate and sensitive digital note-taking device, and gives the user the feel of writing on paper. It also features a built-in 2-mega pixel camera that captures detailed images. Garmin-Asus’ newest Android smartphone offers powerful, precise navigation that brings people and places together. The A10 integrates Google Mobile Services with one-click access to Google Maps, Gmail, YouTube, calendar, contacts and Android market, where users can find more than 30,000 applications to personalize their phone.

KINGMAX's Success Story of Diversification-

COMPUTEX 2010 is one of the most anticipated events of the year. As usual, during this grand exhibition, the KINGMAX Group showcased the latest products. Over the years, KINGMAX has dedicated enormous efforts in developing memory products such as overclocking memory modules, high-capacity memory cards and external hard drives. To achieve the goal of diversification, KINGMAX has now ventured into the mobile phone battery industry and launched mobile encryption product.

They also showcased one of the most highly anticipated products – DDRIII Long-Dimm 2400MHz 4GB with Nano Thermal Transfer DLC. Not only does it have huge capacity of 4GB, it also boasts of an ultra-fast operating frequency at 2400MHz. Moreover, incorporation of the advanced Nano Thermal technology replaces traditional heat sink, making this DRAM module light-weighted and environmentally friendly.

KINGMAX also announced 32GB 600x CF card and 128GB SDXC card. Also, a variety of USB flash drives with stylish designs and varying capacities were showcased. Consumers can select products according to their personal preferences. In the third quarter of this year, KINGMAX expects to launch the KINGCALL mobile communications encryption card. It is a technology that is embedded in a microSD device; so with a quick plug users will not need to worry about being wiretapped. For users who value privacy, it is definitely a convenient alternative to the traditional encrypted phone

Chris Chen

Sales Manager, ADATA

We have been participating in COMPUTEX for the past eight years. All the brands make use of it as a platform for showcasing their latest technologies soon to be launched. This year, we, at A-DATA, showcased a variety of product lines that are going to give users the total solution of leading innovations. We have launched new power supply product lines, high-performance DRAM modules, SATA 6 Gb/s SSD S501 with unrivalled transfer speed and the new-generation USB 3.0 Flash drives N004 and N005. A-DATA offers an assortment of creatively-designed USB drives to bring fun and excitement to everyone’s life. Imagination comes true as the Pumpkin King Jack Skellington from The Nightmare before Christmas and Buzz Lightyear from Toy Story 3 take the stage among the product lines. Meanwhile, the soccer-themed T001 USB drive is ready for kickoff as the passionate fans’ wait for the big game is over.

Apart from announcing our latest series of products, the brand-new corporate identity and the hummingbird icon was seen throughout the booth design to symbolize A-DATA’s solid foundation in the industry and our commitment in becoming a global brand.

AMD

At this year’s COMPUTEX 2010, AMD delivered the first public demonstration of an AMD Fusion processor, initiating the accelerated processing era. The AMD Fusion Family of Accelerated Processing Units (APUs) represents a significant shift in processor architecture and capabilities, combining high-performance serial computing and parallel graphics processing cores onto a single die to improve visual and data-intensive tasks that are pervasive in today’s computing environments.

With the launch of the AMD Fusion Family of APUs planned for the first half of 2011, AMD is positioned to extend its leadership it already enjoys in the consumer PC market with VISION Technology from AMD and in the graphics market with the award-winning ATI RadeonTM family of GPUs. At Computex, both product lines were on display for attendees, including many of the brand-new VISION-powered SKUs recently launched by OEMs. In May, AMD announced a significant platform refresh for its VISION Technology, with as many as 135 new ultra-thin and mainstream notebooks arriving on the market. AMD expects the PC experience to evolve dramatically. It also unveiled the “AMD Fusion Fund”, a vehicle to make strategic investments in companies developing innovative solutions that will take advantage of the forthcoming AMD Fusion family of APUs.

Hitachi GST

Hitachi GST (Global Storage Technologies) used the platform to announce the industry’s broadest family of ultra-slim and light 7mm z-height drives. With the entire family offered in capacities up to 320GB – the industry’s highest 7mm drive capacity in a one-disk design – Hitachi is at the forefront, leading the shift from 9.5mm 2.5-inch drives to 7mm 2.5-inch drives across a broad range of market segments.

From laptops and handhelds to PVRs and blade servers, Hitachi’s new 7mm Z-series family of Travelstar and CinemaStar drives are designed as a direct replacement for today’s standard 2.5-inch, 9.5mm hard drives. All Hitachi Z-series drives feature common connectors and common mounting points for simple integration into existing systems, and enable greater design flexibility to differentiate and meet market demands for new, thinner, lighter and more robust devices. When combining cost per gigabyte and gigabyte per cubic millimeter (GB/mm3), Hitachi 7mm drives are the most cost-effective and space-efficient storage solutions when compared to solid-state drives (SSD), 2.5-inch 9.5mm and 1.8-inch hard drives, offering a compelling value proposition for OEMs and system integrators. Qualification samples of the Travelstar Z5K320 family are now available; volume shipments will begin in July. Volume shipments of the Travelstar Z7K320 and the CinemaStar Z5K320 drive families will begin in August.