ASUS HD TV Monitor T1
ASUS attempts to grab a slice of the HDTV market pie with the unveiling of its TV Monitor T1 series in Europe, which combines a desktop monitor and LCD TV technology, giving you high-quality HDTV broadcast as well as Full HD Blu-ray Disc playback.
The ASUS TV Monitor T1 has built-in TV tuners, allowing you to watch both digital and PAL/ SECAM channels, maximizing your European viewing pleasure. Apart from Full HD capabilities, which let you watch high-quality videos in 1920 x 1080 pixels, the ASUS TV Monitor T1 also features surround sound through its 7-Watt speakers, together with a rich complement of I/O ports and ASUS' Splendid Video Intelligence Technology that enhances color reproduction.
The T1 Series also features ASUS Smart Contrast Ratio technology that brings the display's contrast ratio up to 20000:1. The ASUS TV Monitor T1 comes with a remote control, customizable sound presets, a Splendid Video Intelligence Technology that lets you adjust the display's parameters to ensure optimized colors, and a Splendid Game Mode that boosts those dim and hard-to-see areas in video games all while keeping well-lit area untouched.
Let's hope that a NTSC-capable version will come out soon for the North American market.
Asus DR-950 E-Reader in the Flesh
Electricpig proves that Asus is indeed joining in the e-book battle by posting photos of the yet-to-be-released Asus DR-950 on its site.
The Asus DR-950 appears to have a 9-inch touchscreen display with 1024 x 768 resolution framed with a thin black bezel and a few physical buttons. It is actually almost similar to the Amazon Kindle DX if not for the absence of a physical keyboard. The e-reader measures just 9 millimeters in thickness and weighs 370 grams. It also features 2 or 4GB internal memory with SD slot, WiFi, HSDPA, and WiMax connectivity options, as well as a USB port for sideloading, and a 3.5-mm audio port.
On the software side, the Asus DR-950 offers RSS feeds, translation and text to speech, and can support a variety of file formats like PDF, TXT, Audible, MP3, ePub, HTML, JPEG, GIF, PNG, and BMP.
However, with the e-book market getting fiercer as more new models with even more advanced features come in the picture, how could Asus be able to triumph? We shall soon see!
Asus Cine5 PC Speaker
Asus has come up with a new set of PC speakers that it has called as the world's most compact five channel PC speaker. Asus calls it the Cine5 PC speaker and is designed to provide users with an accurate 5-channel surround sound despite its compact size. It is quite a capable yet compact PC speaker that can provide quality surround sound in your personal space and would be quite ideal for PC gaming or even watching movies.
What makes the Asus Cine5 quite unique is that it is a speaker where an array of speaker drivers are integrated into a single bar design. This helps save space as well as avoid the complexities of installing multiple speaker sets. It has an output level of 15W RMS at 25W maximum sound level. Availability of the Asus Cine5 PC speakers is expected this year. No news yet on how much it will cost.
