• The Home Page:

Starting from where the search starts, let us talk about the home pages of Google, yahoo and Bing. Google has white background with the word Google written in typical colors; blue, red, yellow and green. There are times when we see various kinds of paintings around this word. Images, News, Groups, Books, Scholar, and Gmailare the main tabs on the top left. A lot of other features are there in the “more” section.

Yahoo search home page, on the other hand, is simpler than Google’s. It has plain white background with Yahoo written in red and options like Web, Images, Video, Local, and Shopping on the top of search bar.  More options are available in the “More” section.

Now, Bing is a bit attractive than the previous plain white pages. With Bing written in white, a search bar and options like Images, Videos, Shopping, News, Maps and Travel, the search engine is equipped with beautiful backgrounds. These backgrounds are usually photos of different parts of world, with small highlighted sections that tell a story about the location. Go to MSN, Windows Live and Bing Travel straight from this home page. In terms of appearance and looks, Bing home page is certainly on the top of other search engines.

• Search Results:

As far as Bing is concerned, the search results are comprised of two categories; on the left hand side there are quick tabs to centralize the search, and a central array of categorized search results.

Yahoo has a main array of categorized search, plus a right hand column of sponsored results. On the top, similar search phrases are also provided.

Do I need to tell about how Google search result page looks? It is almost same as the Yahoo result page in looks, with categorized search mainly on the page, and a right hand column of sponsored search. In terms of quality of search results, this is obvious that Google has no match.

• Airfare Search:

Regarding airfare search, Bing is the winner. It has included the Faircast Technology in Bing Travel, which shows recent history of airfares, as well as predicts likely future modifications in the rates. Yahoo comes second with providing the facility to compare aerial fares. Sadly, Google renders no such service. So, with all honesty, Bing is given the trophy for best airfare search.

• Hotel Search:

Again, this is the department of Bing and Yahoo, only. Google does not offer a travel service. Bing uses the same technology for hotel search too. Search for accommodation in a specified area, and Bing will show the historical rates of hotels along with the current ones, and will tell you whether the current deal is good to have. Yahoo Travel tells the searcher about ‘Getaway Sale’ pricing for hotel rooms in case such pricing is being offered. ‘Good Deal’ tag is displayed with a result when such discount is being made as a part of promotion offered by Yahoo. Price range search is also part of Yahoo search. Here, Yahoo deserves to stand in the middle block of victory stand.

• Refining Search:

When it comes to search refining; Bing stands out from the other search engines. Its Explorer Pane is present on left side of every search, so the refinement is just a click away. As far as Google and yahoo are concerned, an extra click is needed to show the options in Yahoo as well as Google. Therefore, Bing again gets the award in refined search.

• Video Search:

At last, here is something interesting. When you search for “Akon” in videos on Bing, you will get a whole lot of video results. Interestingly, almost 90% of these videos are by AOL or MySpace (of course, YouTube is powered by Google!). Choose one of the videos and you will get it paying on the top of results. Also, these results can further be refined by length, screen size, resolution etc.

Google shows the results as the user chooses; in grid or in large thumbnails. One can filter the results by duration and source. Clicking a video will play it in the upper right corner of the window.

As far as yahoo videos are concerned, it offers “Official Videos” option. It either plays the videos at the down side of the window, or takes to the server. Best among all these three in video search department is indeed Bing.

So, each of these three is specialist in certain areas and their expertise differs in various departments of search. Seriously speaking, Bing seems to have enough potential to threaten Google’s monopoly. Anyways, the fact is that whenever we have to make a search about something, we “Google it”. I suppose Bing has to go a long way in order to make its phrase!

Source: pcworld

Today, we shall provide you with some useful tips to follow, and keep in mind before going to buy a monitor. Once you know exactly what should be important to note, you can go shopping alone and quite confidently.

1. LCD Displays:

LCD displays are very common these days, and are available in a variety of sizes and forms. There are a lot of factors involved behind the inclination of people towards these displays.

Size: It is an important factor to note. The entry level LCD monitors begin from 17” to 19”, usually. These are sometimes paired with inexpensive PC deals. These displays have usually an analog video input only, and no digital video input, thus they are quite simple to use. For ordinary office work and web browsing purposes, these monitors work quite well, provided they offer fine resolution and screen adjustments.

Professional level LCD monitors have usually wider screen. They offer better image quality via digital inputs; usually DVI. Other features include better image adjusting controls, integrated USB ports and memory card slots, a larger set of ergonomic options, higher resolutions, asset control, and hardware calibration. Few pro LCDs provide color-calibration tools, too.

Native Resolution: LCD display consists of two glass-plates holding inside them an arrangement of liquid crystals. Two glass-plates hold thousands of pixels filled with liquid crystals, and there is a source of light at the back. There are two transparent electrodes and two polarizing filters also; between them is present a layer of molecules. Liquid crystal molecules are lined up in a certain direction before an electric charge is applied to them. When an electric charge is applied, variation results in construction of different levels of grey. Colors are subtracted from white light and thus, color elements are displayed.

Most of the 17” to 19” LCD displays use native resolution of 1280-by-1024, 23” to 24” have 1920 by 1200, and 30” have 2560 by 1600. Do not forget that you can never exceed an LCD’s native resolution.

Aspect Ratio: It is the relationship of screen’s width to screen’s height. These days, an ideal ratio is 16:9, which is perfect for working in large spreadsheets, programs that contain many toolbars or palettes, to view documents or two Web pages side-by-side, and for watching movies.

Viewing Angle: It indicates how far you can move to the side, above, or below from the center of the display before the image quality depreciates to intolerable levels. There isn’t any industry standard method for measuring this angle. Best way to decide is by having a close look at the monitor. Discard any option having a viewing angle below 150 degrees.

Contrast Ratio: It refers to the brightest and darkest light values that a display can generate at a time. Do not settle for anything less than 400:1 and above 600:1. Here, too, no industry standard measurement means exist. Below 400:1, you will have either too washed out colors, or too darkened screen with the screen adjustments you make.

Brightness: This feature measures the greatest amount of light that comes from a screen displaying pure white. 250cd/m2 or above is the most suitable and useful level, which will work well for you. Note if the brightness level can be adjusted or not.

Special Inputs: These days, people attach a lot of gadgets with one another for different purposes. It would be better if you buy such a monitor which is fully equipped with special inputs such as S video ports, memory card slots, component and composite input, and HDMI ports.

Response Time: Basically, there are two main types of LCD response time. Rise-and-fall response time measures the time it takes a pixel to turn from black to white (rise) and then back to black (fall). Gray-to-gray response time measures the time it takes for a pixel to change from one shade of gray to another. It varies from brand to brand. Most of the LCD displays have fast response time.

Physical Adjustments: You must check out if the monitor you are interested in can be adjusted at different angles or not. This is a very important aspect to keep in mind while buying a monitor as one has to make many adjustments during working.

So, these are the basic points upon which your decision to choose a monitor must depend. Do check the working of your object before buying it, as precaution is better than cure.

Display Size:

You will find two options in flat screen HD TVs; LCD and Plasma. If you are going for a TV having less than 37” screen, you have no choice but an LCD. But if you plan for something bigger and greater than 37”, you can choose between Plasma and LCD; comparing their respective features and attributes.

Plasma:

Plasma is expensive; this is the biggest fact about it. It is a plane and flat panel display, used for huge screens mostly. These displays are brighter and more vivid than LCD displays due to difference of working and substances used in them.

There are two plates of glass used in Plasma’s working which hold countless minute cells inside. These cells are full of two gases; neon and xenon. Between the glass-plates on both sides of these tiny cells, there are placed long electrodes. A potential difference is caused by charging these electrodes. When a difference in voltage happens, ionization of neon and xenon occurs and creates plasma. These ions start moving towards the electrodes resulting in collisions, which give birth to photons.

The pixels of Plasma display consist of three sub pixel cells which are red, blue and green colored phosphors. Variation in the current which flows through these phosphors increases or decreases the concentration of these colors. This is the rationale behind rich color display of Plasma TV. Plasma range begins from 37” and extends to 65”, costing about $800 to $15000.

Plasma’s Drawbacks:

1. Plasma Displays are prone to burn-ins.
2. It consumes way more power than LCD.
3. It is pricier than LCD.

LCD:

Liquid crystal display consists of two glass-plates holding inside them an arrangement of liquid crystals. Two glass-plates hold thousands of pixels filled with liquid crystals, and there is a source of light at the back. There are two transparent electrodes and two polarizing filters also; between them is present a layer of molecules. Liquid crystal molecules are lined up in a certain direction before an electric charge is applied to them. When an electric charge is applied, variation results in construction of different levels of grey.

Same three colored sub pixels are present in LCD too. Colors are subtracted from white light and thus, color elements are displayed. LCD models vary in size, starting from 15” to 65”. It is not a very expensive choice, yet it is a nice one.

LCD’s Drawbacks:

• It is beaten by Plasma when it comes to contrast ratio, color accuracy, and deeper blacks.
• It can not produce pictures as large and bright as Plasma.
• Sometimes, moving objects are smudged in LCD.
• Single pixels of LCD can burn out, which we see as black spots.

Now when you have the plus and minus points of both technologies, you can decide according to your own choice that what you should bring in to your home.

Contrast Ratio:

It refers to the brightest and darkest light values that a display can generate at a time. The higher the contrast ratio is, the better the TV’s quality is. LCD has a low quality contrast ratio (starting at about 600:1) as compared to Plasma, which offers very high contrast ratio (starting at about 1000:1). Unfortunately, there is no authentic method to identify a TV’s contrast ratio. Plasma offers deeper blacks than LCD.

Aspect Ratio:

It is the relationship of screen’s width to screen’s height. Usual TV sets have an aspect ratio of 4:3, and the modern wide screen ones have an aspect ratio of 16:9. You should go for the wide screen TVs because HDTV is a wide screen system and also, DVDs look way better on wide screens.

Video Inputs:

It determines that what kind of and how many sources you can use with your TV. The most widely compatible is the Composite Video, though it has the lowest quality. It is present in every device that has video output sources. S-video offers better than Composite quality, and is present in all devices else than the standard VCRs. Component video is the minimum standard for connecting HD cable, satellite set top boxes, and progressive scan DVD and Blu-ray Disc players. VGA is primarily used for computer connections. DVI is one of the highest quality inputs that can connect to devices with HDMI outputs and computers. Today, the dominant digital connection interface for HDTVs is HDMI, which is a DVI plus input.

Resolution:

Apparent picture details are determined through resolution and contrast ratio. Plasma and LCD have fixed pixel display. Basically, there are five types of resolutions used these days; 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i, and 1080p. 480i is used for analog standard TV; 480p for DVDs; 720p and 1080i formats are used by satellite, cable, and over-the-air-broadcast HD content providers, plus some advanced DVD players; and 1080p is used for Blu-ray players. List down your priorities, and choose one. But we would advise you to invest in a model that supports 1080p, as your Flat Screen HD TV is a long term investment.

Now when you have major points clear in your mind, we are going to provide you with some tips, which will surely help you in long turn.

1. Get a TV set with at least some HDMI inputs; the next era is of multi-connectivity. Look into for those which have more side and front ports and rear.
2. Compare different TV displays using various input sources, mark the difference, and make your decision.
3. Take with you a DVD with dim-lit scenes, and check the displays with the DVD. Look into the displays that show deeper black.
4. Very important: try to check the remote control before buying a TV. A non friendly complex remote can destroy your state of sheer joy.
5. Check the video settings before buying a TV.

Now that you are well equipped with pre-shopping knowledge; you must be confident to head towards the shopping area of your city, inspect all those trendy HDTVs like an expert, and buy the one that suits you best.

Written by “Seemab”

This new Windows Touch Technology is planned to be introduced into Windows 7. Those who are behind the creation of Widows 7 are highly confident about the technology. According to them, this tech will not only get limited to PCs, but it will spread to capture and influence a wider scenario with its usage in devices related to shopping, our kitchens, public places and even in our portables.Like Apple, MS will include the multi touch functions in its Touchscreen PCs, too. Experience will be quite similar to that with an iPhone while flipping, tapping, nipping, and twirling on the screen. All the major functions of scrolling, zooming and rotating the page or screen will depend upon different movements of fingers. MS has decided to improve the function of horizontal scrolling than Apple, by making it a two fingered gesticulation. Also, the ever-loved phenomenon of cut paste will be nothing more than a one figure function.

BBC states that this new technology by MS will prove to be “a first class way to interact with your PC alongside mouse and keyboard”. A great deal of anticipation has already attached to these upcoming Touchscreen PCs, though Windows 7 is not expected to be launched till 2010. Thus, there is plenty of time to be hopeful regarding the beauty of this system.

Written by “Seemab”