工研院雲端運算中心 揭牌

工商時報 2009-12-23 【楊玟欣／台北報導】

工研院雲端運算中心昨（22）日揭牌上線，工研院院長李鍾熙及雲端運算中心主任闕志克，正式宣佈研發團隊到位，將聯合業界搶攻雲端運算百億元商機，工研院攜手對象除中華電信外，也將網羅網路儲存、電源供應器等廠商共同打造雲端商機。

此外，工研院也將自行開發雲端運算作業系統軟體，未來雲端運算商機將軟硬通吃。

李鍾熙表示，雲端運算將為資通訊產業帶來革命性的改變，並將進一步影響各行各業運用資訊科技與網路科技的能力與型態，對台灣經濟的轉型升級非常重要。李鍾熙表示，工研院今年9月成立雲端運算科技中心，並延攬包括闕志克等國內外頂尖人才組成研發團隊，同時建構實驗室，連結產業界，希望以最快的速度，協助國內產業搶攻新一波的商機。

闕志克指出，雲端運算初期研發團隊已經陸續到位，並且進駐新的實驗室，未來雲端運算科技中心將致力於國內雲端運算系統軟硬體，及產業應用開發。闕志克表示，將針對三大部分作階段性規劃，第一是雲端科技的硬體整合技術，第二則是，開發更完整更高效率的系統軟體服務；第三，則是雲端運算產業應用。

闕志克表示，工研院將建立雲端貨櫃型資料中心，貨櫃內可裝置1,000台至2,000台伺服器，以及相關設備，只要接上水電即可運作。工研院指出，雲端貨櫃目的在於讓業者可以快速建立雲端運算中心。

Nook遲交 邦諾補償100美元禮券

工商時報 2009-12-22 【陳穎芃／綜合外電報導】

華爾街日報報導，美國連鎖書店邦諾（Barnes & Noble）表示部分預購Nook電子書閱讀器的消費者可能無法在聖誕夜前收到商品，因此公司將針對這些顧客提供每人100美元線上禮券做為補償。

單價259美元的Nook是邦諾搶在今年購物季前推出的強檔商品，預備以此挑戰亞馬遜Kindle。Nook自10月上市後市場反應好壞參半，即便有部分消費者抱怨Nook開機速度過慢，但整體需求依舊超乎預期。

早在購物季開跑前，邦諾已提醒消費者盡早預購，不料公司在購物季開跑後還是不及應付龐大需求。邦諾日前表示Nook已經缺貨，因此未能及時訂購的消費者必須等到明年2月才能出貨。

邦諾於上周五再度向消費者發函表示，部分顧客預購的Nook可能無法在12月24日前送達。邦諾於信中表示：「公司將在23日向這些顧客寄出延後出貨通知，並附上價值100美元的禮券供顧客在邦諾線上商店使用。」這份禮券是Nook價格的三分之一以上，足以展現邦諾的誠意。

邦諾發言人克伊婷（Mary Ellen Keating）周日表示，凡是先前預購Nook並收到預定出貨通知的消費者，「絕大多數」都能如期收到商品，但由於需求高過預期，因此公司正盡全力提升出貨效率。

對手亞馬遜的Kindle在2008年11月也面臨過同樣的缺貨問題，如今有了過去的經驗，亞馬遜在今年購物季來臨前就做好萬全準備。亞馬遜在購物季開跑時表示，259美元的Kindle存貨充足，能在12月24前出貨。

亞馬遜至今從未對外透露Kindle的詳細營收數字，但該公司近日表示12月是Kindle年度業績最佳的月份。研究機構Forrester Research 10月公布的調查報告也預期2009年電子書閱讀器出貨量將達到300萬台，其中30％集中在11月和12月。

電子紙創辦人：電子書需提供更好體驗

(中央社記者潘淑婷台北21日電)電子紙E-Ink創辦人Barrett Comiskey今天表示，電子書市場未來仍有極大成長空間，台灣業者欲掌握商機，不只是發展硬體功能，更重要是提供讀者良好的使用體驗。

Comiskey今天出席「兩岸網路產業暨電子書國際研討會」，以「Why Amazon works?」為題，分析亞馬遜推出電子閱讀器Kindle的成功案例。他說，Kindle使用方式簡易，加上數位內容豐富，是亞馬遜成功之道。

他於會後接受媒體專訪時提到，未來電子紙的趨勢會朝彩色版發展，且應會朝整合型功能發展，將有點類似邦諾書店 (Barnes & Nobel)前陣子推出的電子閱讀器nook。

他解釋，彩色電子紙目前成本仍過高，但技術上，反應速度稍慢，對於想用彩色電子紙觀看影音的使用者來說，不符需求，因此他認為，彩色電子紙仍需時日醞釀。

不過他強調，台灣電子書業者不該只追求硬體設備升級，而更應專注在提升使用者體驗，例如，如何讓讀者能在手機、閱讀器、電腦等不同平台上閱讀同一份內容，也就是跨平台的整合，將是台灣業者的重要發展方向。

亞馬遜目前在電子書產業扮演主導角色，當問及未來是否大者恆大時，Comiskey表示，電子書市場才剛起步，成長空間還很大，未來競爭態勢還未定，若有業者能掌握版權管理、內容提供等優勢，絕對會嶄露頭角。

981221(中央社記者潘淑婷攝)

MSI Wind U135 hands-on impressions

You didn't expect it to rain Pine Trail netbooks without MSI dropping a new Wind, did you? Come January the $330 10-inch Wind U135 will replace the older Diamondville U100 with its new 1.66GHz Atom N450 CPU, 1GB of RAM, a 250GB hard drive, Windows 7 Starter and a six-cell battery. But the U135 gets updated with more than just new netbook specs -- the Taiwanese netbook pioneer has slightly tweaked the chassis with a new keyboard, touchpad and lid design. Read on for our thoughts.

Nook 1.1 update hitting now

Right on schedule, the Barnes and Noble Nook is kicking out a software update (we rebooted to get the download to start). We've heard this will fix some of the issues we had with the unit in our review -- but we'll update you once we've had a little time to play around with it.

Some things we've noticed so far:

*Page updating on the E Ink display does seem to be a tiny bit faster. Nothing mindblowing, but a little bit better.

*B&N has fixed the page numbering issues. There is now a clear number and progress bar along the bottom of the screen.

*Overall the navigation and color screen loading times seem improved. The experience is definitely faster -- even scrolling through book covers seems a bit improved.

*There is still pausing and lag in the UI. This isn't a sea change, but it's clear they've cleaned some elements up.

[Thanks, anonymous tipster]

Barnes & Noble giving $100 for Nook pre-orders that miss Christmas.

Haven't got your Nook yet? You may actually be in luck. For people who pre-ordered early enough to expect a pre-Christmas delivery, Barnes & Noble is promising a $100 B&N.com gift card if it misses December 24th -- which is apparently distinctly possible. Of course, if you're one of the lucky / unlucky ones to have this on offer, you've probably already seen the email, and if you're a different sort of hapless pre-orderer that won't be seeing a Nook until next year, this is just another reason to curse your lot in life. To think: not only are you not ushering in 2010 from an economy suite in a space hotel, but you're going to wrap up this year reading paper books, without $100 to show for it! Can't we do better as a civilization?

SOURCE : Consumerist

Barnes & Noble Nook to get an update this week? Sure sounds like it.

A tipster who has proven to be reliable in the past says that Barnes and Noble's Nook will get a software update this week -- most likely around Tuesday. The update itself looks to be fairly large, improving some of the major issues we've had with the e-reader -- like page refresh rate and a lot of other little performance issues. Our tipster also says they've played with an updated unit and that it's much, much better, so we're interested to see for ourselves when the update goes down. Until then, check out the (partial) list of bugs and fixes we're hearing the update will include after the break.

*Page turning and formatting of downloaded e-books has been improved.

*Start-up time for My Library, The Daily, and Setting has been improved.

*Barnes & Noble in-store content and promotions roll-out is fully supported.

*Launches reader immediately on Select from The Daily and My Library for books and subscriptions that have already been downloaded.

*Reading Now takes customer straight into the last book page read without reformatting the content.

*Displays the correct time on the status bar.

*No longer unprompted to the home screen when pressing the arrow or the select button.

*Displays correct error-message for pre-ordering books that are not yet available.