Microcontroller Market Starts to grow

Looks like the effects of the economic downturn is over as far as the micro-controller market is concerned. According to this report the market is slat3d to grow to $18.5 billion by 2015. It has already increased by 14% to $12.3 billion compared to 2009. That's encouraging. considering that the micros get into so many segments of the industry that indirectly shows the growth in other areas and corresponding growth in the demand for these devices.

Renesas holds the number 1 spot in terms of market share according to the same report. It is at 29% followed by Freescale at 10%. Other players in this market area include Infineon Technologies, Microchip Technology, and Fujitsu etc.

ASUS Tablets coming in June!!

There's a rush on to get tablets to the market by many companies around the globe. Now comes the announcement by netbook (a category of product that is threatened by the tablets) pioneers Asus that they are going to launch a tablet in Computes in June 2010.

This is going to be based on Tegra processor. That is a special processor again. It'd be a subject of another post soon! There are many a tablet products on the market already. It'd be interesting to see if tablets take away a chunk of the netbook category.

iPad vs. Netbooks

I have talked about how iPad seems to be a product that might make netbooks a redundant category. I came across a post that is completely effusive about why a iPad scores over a netbook. The author talks about not 7, not 10 but 15 reasons where iPad scores over a netbook. The authors lists hardware quality, functionality without hassles,

ready to go, high battery life, terrific user experience with the multi-touch screen, eReader, comics, excellent screen, lots od apps that are already available, speed, gaming, photo frame, portability, the fact that it is not a glorified iPod touch-bigger, and pure pleasure at using it. He quotes extensively from other reviewers. The device does seem to have caught fancy of users everywhere. Will it become the next wave in personal computing is something to be seen!

Read the eulogy to iPad here.

Technology for Education

If an educational institute has Wi-Fi then there are amazing things you can do to help students and be in touch with teachers, add value to the teaching, question forum, discussions; the possibilities are endless! I was kind of sensitized to these aspects by the reminder that came for call for papers for a t4e seminar run by IIT, Mumbai. In my one year, two semester stint so far in this institute i have been experimenting with some of these tools. it was limited by no Wi-Fi access. Students are not able to access the net very easily. But this certainly has possibility of improving teaching bu at least an order of quality.

iPAD Vs. Other eReaders

I have written on this before. There's iPad on one side which not only can read books but let you view video and play games, surf Internet etc. etc. The reader only eReaders as simply trying to duplicate the book reading experience for us. The eInk interface tries to emulate the printed words on a white page kind of feel for the reader. By itself these are nice devices. They not only emulate the book reading experience but also let you carry a slection of books with you and depending on what model it is; it'll let you buy books from a store too.That is an attractive concept by itself except that it has come about at this point in time.

What is happening with the mobile devices, Internet connectivity and laptop/ netbook kind of devices is that there is a push for convergence. People seem to pushing for a device that can give us phone connectivity, Internet connectivity, email and office productivity on the go and so on. It's great if we can have these in one device! These typically would be able to let you read books too. So what if that reading experience is slightly different from reading a paperback! What if the screen glows back at you, what about the convenience of touch screen! What about the convenience of all these functionality compared to just a replacement for current paperbacks!
 I am pretty sure the combine device would win. What exact form it'll take could be debatable but who would want to carry an additional eReader when the device you are carrying can let you read the book you want! You reading habits would need a little change, but that's been changing a lot recently anyway!