Google Nexus 7 Tablet Review

Google has released a number of Nexus branded "hero" smartphones in the past, but the new Google Nexus 7 is the first ever tablet to bear the Google Nexus name. Built by Asus, the Nexus 7 also has the distinction of being the first device to run the Android 4.1 "Jelly Bean" operating system.

While the Nexus 7 offers nothing to consumers that can't be found elsewhere - save for Jelly Bean - it offers a number of refinements to the Android tablet experience in terms of both software and hardware. And it does it all at a sub-$200 price point that is meant to dethrone Amazon's Kindle Fire as the reigning Android tablet of choice for consumers.

With specs like a quad-core processor and a 1280 x 800 pixel display, that seems possible and likely.

Hardware

From a hardware perspective, the Google Nexus 7 by Asus is not very different from existing Android tablets, like the Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 7.0. It measures 198.5mm x 120mm x 10.45mm (7.8in x 4.7in x .4in) in size, weighs 340g (12.0oz), and features a 7-inch ~IPS display that is protected by scratch-resistant glass.

Unlike most other 7-inch tablets, though, Google's low cost flagship tablet offers users a fairly dense 1280 x 800 pixel grid to gaze upon. It's not as sharp as an Apple Retina display, but it's very crisp indeed, and it is easy to view both indoors and outdoors alike.

The unit I reviewed is the limited edition Google I/O 2012 version that features a white back cover that is dimpled like a golf ball. The normal retail version features a backplate that matches the front's dark color; it also receives a metallic band around its edge. Both versions run the same quad-core NVIDIA Tegra 3 processor and 1GB of RAM, but the I/O version is limited to 8GB of internal storage while the retail version can be had in 8 or 16GB configurations, for $199 or $249 respectively. There is no ~microSD expansion slot, so Google is expecting Nexus 7 users to make good use of its cloud-based Google Play services.

Google and Asus decided to leave out a rear-facing camera on the Nexus 7, instead opting for a lone forward-facing 1.2 megapixel camera for use in video chats. A micro-USB port on the bottom edge of the tablet is used for charging and PC cable access, and it sits next to a 3.5mm headphone jack.

The only other hardware features on the Nexus 7 are the power/standby key and the volume rocker, both of which are located on the upper right hand edge of the tablet.

The main Android back, home, and task switcher controls are provided entirely on-screen, just as they have been by default since Android 3.0 Honeycomb. It makes for a very clean design, and the texture of the rear panel makes it a comfortable design to hold. Add to that a rock solid build and you have a real winner - save for that lack of microSD expansion.

Usability

From a usability perspective, the most interesting aspect of the Google Nexus 7 and its Android 4.1 Jelly Bean operating system is that everything on this tablet works much more like an Android smartphone than other Android tablets. The notification area has been moved up to the top of the screen, the main app tray button is found on the bottom of the screen, surrounded by shortcuts that are available from every home screen. On the 7-inch Nexus 7, at least, the device operates only in portrait mode when on the home screen, whereas most previous Android tablets where expected to be used primarily in landscape mode.

All of those changes make the device much more user friendly in my opinion. The exception, of course, being the fact that the home screen is locked into portrait mode. That makes things awkward when using an app in landscape mode, since you have to physically rotate the device when you jump back to home. I see no obvious rationale for this design decision.

Otherwise, the Jelly Bean OS on the Nexus 7 feels by and large like an over-sized smartphone - think Samsung Galaxy Note on growth hormones. I was never a fan of the Honeycomb user experience, and feel that this more unified experience between tablets and smartphones is a good thing. I'm just not sure I'll still think that when I finally get around to using a 10-inch Jelly Bean tablet...

Other changes to the notification area can be found on phones and tablets alike. For example, there are no longer Honeycomb style configuration buttons for things like display brightness and Wi-Fi. All that is left is the link to the general Settings app and a screen rotation lock.

But what we gain is a new set of notification features. New style notifications can be expanded with a two-finger swipe to reveal more information, and some notifications can even include on-screen buttons for direct actions. The "call" and "message" buttons for missed calls are a perfect example.

Google Now is Google's response to Apple's Siri - of sorts. It can respond to voice queries and will, depending on the request, respond with a "card" of data and, potentially, some very well-crafted artificial speech, or with standard Google search results. The system will also try to figure you out, offering cards based on what it perceives to be your needs. For example, it will show you the time at home when it thinks you are traveling, and it will warn you of traffic issues for what it believes to be your morning and evening commutes, even going so far as to warn you when extra travel time is required to make appointments.

It's all kinda cool, but does not seem to work all that well for me, at least.

The home screen's widget system has received a bit of an overhaul. Unneeded widgets can now be tossed off of the display, obviating the need to drag them to the trash can icon. When moving widgets from home screen panel to panel, existing widgets will attempt to reorganize themselves to make room, and the widget being dropped on a new panel will reduce its own size, if possible, to make itself fit. It's a smooth process.

In fact, smooth is a good way to describe the Nexus 7 in general. Google claims to have spent a great deal of time increasing the frame rate of animations and user interactions on Android 4.1, and it shows. Everything moves more fluidly, and the Tegra 3 processor proves itself to be both cool-running and fast in the Nexus 7

Galaxy MDT GeForce GT 520 Review

Given the affordability of high-res, big-screen displays, people are increasingly adopting multi-monitor setups for gaming and productivity. Although it's easier than ever to outfit your home office with several 27" screens, it wasn't long ago that such a setup required pricey specialized hardware. Nvidia released its TwinView dual-display architecture back in 2001 and ATI followed with HydraVision on the dual-head Radeon 7500 and 8500.

Cheaply enabling more than two displays with a single card, however, is only a recent luxury for consumers. It wasn't until 2010 that ATI Eyefinity (now AMD-branded) shipped with the Radeon HD 5000 series, supporting three to six displays on one card. With Single Large Surface (SLS) technology, the cards can group together multiple monitors, which the operating system recognizes as a single ultra-high-resolution screen.

Nvidia responded to Eyefinity with Vision Surround on the GeForce GTX 400 series, supporting up to three monitors for a max resolution of 7680x1600 (2560x1600 per screen). In other words, Nvidia's single-GPU multi-display support is limited to half of AMD's. This isn't a major concern for gamers, who likely wouldn't want to run more than three displays on one card anyhow, but it's a limitation for productivity applications.

In fact, multi-monitor technology was originally designed for productivity and it's still the driving force behind such technology today. Graphic designers, video editors, stock traders and other professionals greatly benefit from several screens, but they don't necessarily demand the raw GPU power high-end gamers do. Hoping to address those needs, Galaxy has begun offering Nvidia's cards with enhanced multi-display support.

The board partner recently launched its Galaxy MDT GeForce GTX 580, supporting four screens for a maximum resolution of 7680x1200. However, being based on Nvidia's flagship single-GPU card, the solution is still a bit beefier (and pricier) than someone might need to view Photoshop or stocks across four screens. Thus, the company has introduced an affordable MDT X4 card based on the low-end GeForce GT 520.

Samsung Focus S Review

The Samsung Focus S is one of the two new Windows Phone 7.5 smartphones for AT&T that succeed last year's Focus that was build around WP7. The second model is called Focus Flash (reviewed here), which is a more compact Windows Phone that is also more affordable. Of the two, the Focus S can be considered the spiritual successor to the Focus as it has a number of upmarket features over the smaller Focus Flash.

Where the original Focus had a strong familiar resemblance to the Samsung Galaxy S running Android, the Focus S is as close to a Windows Phone 7.5 version of the Galaxy S II as one can get.

Despite a nicer display and a much better camera, the Focus S shares the same processor and RAM as its lower-cost stablemate, which means that the everyday experience is largely the same. Still, the Focus S is an impressive smartphone, with fast performance and the familiar Windows Phone interface – flawed as it still may be. Read on to find out whether the Focus S is worth the extra $150 on-contract price over its Flash sibling.

Hardware

If you were to remove the Windows Phone branding and hide the capacitive buttons below the display, you would not be faulted for mistaking the Samsung Focus S for a variant of the Galaxy S II line of Android smartphones. The design cues are very close and the only exterior hardware differences are the requisite capacitive buttons and physical camera key that is required by Windows Phone 7.5. While the Focus from last year had a couple of differentiating factors in its physical design, the Focus S does not break any industrial design ground and fits right in line with Samsung's other smartphones.

That means that the Focus S is exceptionally thin and light, measuring only 126mm x 66.8mm x 8.5mm (4.96in x 2.63in 0.33in) and weighing in at a feathery 111g (3.9oz). Unfortunately, that also means that it is rather cheap feeling, since it is made entirely of plastic - save for the display, of course.

The display is the same 4.3-inch, WVGA (480 x 800 pixel) resolution Super AMOLED Plus unit seen on the global and AT&T versions of the Galaxy S II. The 'Plus' part of the display is an upgrade over the displays on the Focus and Focus Flash and refers to its use of a standard RGB pixel layout as opposed to the much-derided PenTile layout. Colors are extremely vibrant, viewing angles are infinite, and its inky blacks complement the Windows Phone Metro interface well. I did not have any issues viewing the screen outdoors in bright light, which can be a point of difficulty for AMOLED displays.

Below the display are three capacitive buttons for back, Start, and search, as seen on all Windows Phone smartphones. Above it are the earpiece, light sensors, and a new 1.3 megapixel front-facing camera. The sides of the phone are home to a dual-stage camera key, power/sleep/unlock key (right side), and volume rocker (left side). All the buttons have good travel and feedback, but I noticed that they protrude out from the side of the phone a bit farther than most smartphones, which made them prone to being pressed while in a pocket (especially the camera key).

The Focus S features a patterned back that provides a modicum of grip when holding the phone. It's not as texture deep as the Galaxy S II, but it is better than a smooth, glossy back. Inset into the battery cover is the same 8 megapixel autofocus camera and flash that the Galaxy S II sports. However, due to the limitation of the Focus S' single-core processor, it does not record 1080p HD video, but maxes out at 720p resolution.

Usability

The Samsung Focus S is powered by a 1.4GHz, single-core Qualcomm processor. The phone performs swiftly, and Microsoft's attractive Metro interface scoots around with ease. The new processor doesn't make too much of a difference in every day use, but apps open up a tad quicker than on the 1GHz Focus, and processor-intensive games don't hold the phone back at all.

Windows Phone 7.5 offers a number of performance and usability enhancements over previous versions, including a form of multitasking and live tile support for third-party apps. Microsoft's vision of quick, glance-able information works as the company promises, but when apps are opened, it still takes longer than I would prefer for them to update with new information and be ready for use.

Surprisingly, the on-screen keyboard on the Focus S did not perform as well during my tests as it does on other Windows Phone smartphones. Instead of keeping up with my quick-tapping thumbs, the keyboard had a tendency to lag and then catch up, as if it were always two steps behind. I have a feeling that Samsung could address this with a software update, but it was quite frustrating.

Crucial Adrenaline SSD Review

Last year we reviewed OCZ's RevoDrive Hybrid, which saw the marriage of a 1TB hard drive and a pair of 50GB SandForce SSDs on a PCI Express card. The idea was to use the SSD controllers and 100GB of NAND flash as a high-speed cache for the much larger spinning disk drive.

Potentially achieving performance close to that of a SandForce SF-2281 SSD with a 1TB storage capacity was very appealing, however there were some notable drawbacks. At $485 (since dropped to $330), the RevoDrive sounds like reasonable value at $0.48 per gigabyte (in SSD terms), but in reality the RevoDrive Hybrid performed nothing like a high-end SSD in most tests. As a result, we had a hard time recommending OCZ's hybrid solution.

Then on January, Crucial announced their latest SSD series called Adrenaline. Not meant to replace their existing and well regarded m4 SSDs, the Adrenaline is a cache solution meant to work along your existing disk drive, using a 50GB SSD to act as solid state flash-based cache for your larger primary hard drive.

OCZ also offers a similar caching solution called Synapse, which comes in 64GB and 128GB capacities. Though after our review of the RevoDrive Hybrid, OCZ didn’t seem so keen for us to take another pass.

Essentially what we have is Crucial’s answer to the OCZ Synapse. The Adrenaline costs $110 for the 50GB version, while the slightly larger Synapse costs $135. Note that Crucial's drive allocates 50GB for caching while 14GB is provisioned for performance optimization, so really both drives feature 64GB of NAND flash memory.

Like the Synapse, and of course, the RevoDrive Hybrid the new Adrenaline uses the Dataplex software. Although we had found licensing issues to be a headache before we also acknowledged that the software does work rather well. With that said, let’s move on to check out the Adrenaline in better detail...

Adrenaline in Detail

The Crucial Adrenaline looks like a typical SSD and that's because it is. The drive is based on the m4 design featuring the same controller and NAND flash memory.

Crucial claims the Adrenaline can achieve read speeds of up to 500MB/s and write throughput of 95MB/s, the same figures they claim for the 64GB version of the m4. Of course, ultimately those speeds will be determined by how well the caching software works.

The Marvell 88SS9174 controller along with a large 256MB cache are used to improve small write performance and eliminate any 'stuttering' issues. The Adrenaline is equipped with 8x8GB 25nm chips (29F64G08CFACB) and feature Micron's high-speed ONFI 2.1 NAND interface for 166 MT/s with 512-byte industry standard sector size.

Like all SSDs, the Adrenaline cites very low power consumption figures, at idle it uses less than 100mW and when active consumes just 150mW. It measures 100.5 x 69.85 x 9.50mm and weighs 75 grams. The drive is compatible with both laptops and desktops. Crucial supplies a 3.5” adapter in case your chassis doesn't have a 2.5" bay.

Samsung Galaxy Note Review

Samsung's new Galaxy Note is a unique device in the smartphone market. Straddling the line between a smartphone and a tablet, the Note features a massive 5.3-inch display, which is considerably larger than the screen on any other smartphone available today (just see the image below sitting alongside an iPhone). Because of this, the Note is rather unwieldy in the hand, and nearly impossible to use one handed.

Trying to make the most of the smartphone's larger footprint, Samsung has attempted to add functionality to the Note with its "don't-call-it-a-stylus" S Pen input device. But once again the Note's dominant feature is its 5.3-inch, Super AMOLED display that packs a dense 1280 x 800 pixel resolution. The form factor alone will place many potential buyers at odds, while others might appreciate the hybrid nature of the device. Read on to learn our findings.

Hardware

The Samsung Galaxy Note borrows heavily from the designs Samsung has used for its Galaxy S II line of smartphones. In fact, one would not be faulted for thinking that the Galaxy Note was just a Galaxy S II on steroids. The big display looks fantastic, with great, punchy colors, tremendous viewing angles, and good outdoor visibility. The pixel layout is the much-derided PenTile format, but since there are so many pixels packed onto the screen, you have to really hunt to see any PenTile patterns in images. It really is a great display.

Because of the massive screen, the Note has equally large dimensions - and therein lie the difficulties I had with using it as a phone. The Note measures 147mm (5.78in) tall and 83mm (3.27in) across, which means that it feels absolutely massive when held in the hand. Even compared to the already large Samsung Galaxy S II Skyrocket with its 4.5-inch display, the Note is a enormous beast (and it makes the 3.5-inch iPhone 4S look positively diminutive). I am unable to reach the corners of the screen with my thumb without having to significantly move the Note around in my hand and stretch to my hand's fullest extent, which gives me concern that the Note will slip out of my hand and fall to the ground.

Thus, using the Galaxy Note is a two-handed affair, and there really isn't a way to get around it -- unless you are a pro basketball player, I suppose. However, despite its large dimensions, the Note remains very thin at only 9.7mm (0.38in) thick. As with many thin Samsung smartphones, the thin profile of the Note certainly makes it feel even larger than it actually is.

The rear cover of the Note is made of the familiar, thin plastic material that Samsung has used on many of its prior models, but the Note's back features a classier texture than the others that makes it feel as if it is of higher quality. The textured back helps in handling the device, though I am not sure it will prevent users from eventually dropping it.

Tucked in the lower right corner of the Note's frame is the S Pen input device. The S Pen uses Wacom technology and works with the digitizer in the Note's display to allow users to draw and activate things on the screen with the pen-like tip. The tip has 256 levels of pressure sensitivity, so apps that support the S Pen's capabilities can allow the user to draw thick or thin lines depending on how much pressure they put on the screen.

The S Pen also has a function button on the side of it to perform various tasks like screen capture. Unlike the Scrybe pen for HTC's Flyer tablet, the S Pen does not require a battery. The housing that the S Pen fits into is snug, and the pen won't fall out unintentionally. Still, the S Pen is very thin and small, and many users will likely lose it at some point during their Galaxy Note ownership (AT&T and Samsung are offering replacement S Pens for $29 a pop).

Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 7.0 Review

Until Amazon's Kindle Fire hit the market late last year, no Android-powered tablet had made even the smallest of impacts on the marketplace. With its $199.99 price tag and customized user interface, the Kindle Fire was a real success.

Samsung is now aiming to grab a significant piece of that success by building its own low-cost Android tablet. The catch is that Samsung's new entry, the Galaxy Tab 2 7.0, looks anything but low-cost. In fact, it features a much better spec sheet than the Kindle Fire, and uses the same streamlined body design as its more expensive brethren.

With a price of $249.99 for the Wi-Fi-only model, the Galaxy Tab 2 7.0 is an instant best buy. And when you consider that it is one of the few devices on the market to offer Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich as its operating system, it's even more of a steal.

Hardware

From a hardware perspective, the Galaxy Tab 2 7.0 looks much like any other recent Samsung tablet. This particular model features a black front with a titanium silver rear cover, and it feels very nice in your hands. There's a lot to be said for the 7-inch tablet form factor.

The 7-inch TFT display on the Tab 2 7.0 offers users 1024 x 600 pixels of resolution. The colors it generates are very bright, and the display's viewing angle is surprisingly good for such an inexpensive device.

Dual speakers flank the 30-pin Samsung connector that is found on the bottom of the tablet (when held in portrait mode). The volume and power keys are on the upper right edge of the tablet, and a 3.5mm headphone jack can be found up top. The 3.5mm jack also supports a line-in function.

The Galaxy Tab 2 7.0 measures up at 193mm x 122mm x 10.4mm (7.6in x 4.8in x .41in), which makes it a bit thinner than Amazon's Kindle Fire, though its tapered design makes it feel even thinner than it really is. It weighs a perfectly fine 345g (12.2oz), making it a device that you can hold for hours on end without fatigue.

Usability

While Android isn't as user-friendly as, say, webOS or iOS, Samsung has at least added a few things that make the system more usable than stock Android. Users will enjoy, for example, the mini-apps that can be overlayed on the screen at any time. Mini-apps like the calculator and music player are invaluable. Samsung's updated main menu is also a big bonus, since users can re-arrange apps into any order they like.

While Android 4 shares much with the 3.2 Honeycomb OS that we saw on the first round of Android tablets, there's a bit more polish to how things work, and the result is a better overall experience. As long as you're using the included apps, that is. Apart from those, there are few third party apps currently available that are actually designed with tablet form factors in mind.

But still, Samsung's built-in apps, like the email client and the screen capture feature, feel just fine and make the most of the tablet's form factor. Contacts can be pulled in from either Gmail or Facebook, but there's no real social network support on the device otherwise. You'll have to load your own apps for that. The keyboard offered on the 7.0 is also pretty basic, and you won't find high-end input systems like Swype pre-loaded.

But at least the dual-core 1GHz processor seems to have more than enough power to provide a smooth experience when using the tablet, and that's worth a lot. Especially at its bargain price.

Calling / Data

The Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 7.0 offers no built-in wireless network support apart from Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n for connecting to a home or public Wi-Fi access point. The 7.0 does feature a microphone and speaker, as well as a forward-facing camera, which make it ideal for use with VoIP applications like Skype.

The Tab 2 7.0 also features USB connectivity through its proprietary 30-pin Samsung connector, and there's always Bluetooth 3.0 for using the Tab with devices like wireless stereo headphones and speakers. An infrared port allows the Tab to work as a TV/home entertainment remote control, too.

Users looking for HDMI output will need to use an adapter or a docking station (not included), but the tablet does support DLNA through Samsung's AllShare application.

Messaging

One thing that the Galaxy Tab 2 7.0 does real well is messaging. Even though its 7-inch screen offers relatively low resolution, it is still more than adequate for a nice split-screen email messaging experience. There is an included dedicated Gmail client for Gmail users, but the Samsung email app can be used for accessing most any type of email account - including corporate Exchange servers.

Samsung's ChatOn messaging system is also available, and users of Google Talk instant messaging will also find their app in place. Social network users can download free Twitter, Facebook, and other apps from the Google Play Store if the included Google+ client doesn't cover things.

Raspberry Pi Review & Initial How-To Setup Guide

Six years ago, Raspberry Pi founder Eben Upton set out to reignite programming in schools with a cheap, compact computing platform. Despite targeting students, his foundation's $35 computer captured the imaginations of tinkers worldwide, resulting in overwhelming demand. Interest was so high, that distributorsPremier Farnell and RS buckled under the strain of preorders in February. The former outfit later said demand was 20 times greater than its supply, with orders hitting 700 a second at one point.

When the first 10,000 devices shipped in mid-April, the organization graciously sent us a sample for coverage. Along with a hands-on review of the Pi, today we'll be covering basic steps for setting up the computer and other elemental post-installation tasks to get you up and running with applications. In other words, this should serve as a starting point no matter what you want to do with your Raspberry Pi.

We received a Model B ($35), which is powered by a Broadcom BCM2835 SoC that includes a 700MHz ARM1176JZF-S CPU core, 256MB of RAM and a Broadcom VideoCore IV GPU with OpenGL ES 2.0 that supports 1080p at 30FPS as well as H.264 and MPEG-4 high-profile decoding for smooth Blu-ray playback. Connectivity includes two USB ports, Ethernet, HDMI, RCA video, an SD card slot, a 3.5mm audio jack and two rows of 13 General Purpose Input/Output (GPIO) pins for further expansion.

The Model A ($25, to be released at a later date) ships without Ethernet and has a single USB port. Both models measure 85.60mm x 53.98mm x 17mm, although the SD card and connectors overlap the PCB board edges. Besides the Raspberry Pi itself, you'll also need various other items before you can configure and use the device:

• 5v micro-USB power adapter with at least 700mA (many micro-USB phone chargers work).
• SD card, or micro-SD card in an adapter, with the OS preloaded (4GB to 32GB recommended).
• USB keyboard and mouse (PS/2 to USB adapters might work, but we haven't tested this).
• Powered USB hub if you intend to have more than two USB devices connected.
• Display or TV with HDMI, DVI, Composite or SCART.
• Ethernet cable.

As indicated, the Raspberry Pi uses an SD card for storage. Both of distributors sell preloaded SD cards, but they're easy enough to make yourself if you have a spare card laying around. Currently you can use the Unix tool "dd" to perform the task, or for those using Windows, "Win32DiskImager." We assume you're on Windows or you probably wouldn't need this guide. Before we get started, download the latest Debian Squeeze image andWin32DiskImager. Insert the SD card into your PC if you haven't yet.

Extract both archives and start the imaging tool by double clicking Win32DiskImager.exe. It should find your SD card as the application starts and display it in the top right hand corner of the window. Click on the folder icon, then navigate to and select the Debian ISO you extracted. Double check that the correct drive letter is selected, then click on "write" to load the image. This'll take upwards of five minutes.

Once the process is finished, a popup will notify you that the write was successful. Close the box, exit the application, unmount the SD card from your PC and attach it to the Raspberry Pi. Assuming everything went well, you're ready to fire the device up. The first time the computer boots from the SD card it will automatically configure itself. It will then reboot and load up once again to the login screen.

The default username for Debian is pi and the password is raspberry. You can then load the LXDE desktop environment by entering startx. A few moments later, the desktop will load up as below:

Applications can be found by clicking the icon on the far left of the toolbar, similar to the Start menu in Windows. Creating a user account and updating the OS in Windows is pretty straightforward, but the steps are different in Linux. To create a user account, click on the menu, open the Accessories folder and select LXTerminal. In the terminal window, type sudo adduser username and press enter. For example:

Debian will create the user and prompt you to set a password, as well as other personal information. Fill in the applicable fields and type y to confirm the information is correct. The result looks like this:

With your account created, we can add it to the sudoers list. This will let you issue commands as an administrator. Working in the same terminal window, enter the command sudo leafpad /etc/sudoers.

Leafpad will load the Sudoers file. Under the heading "# User Privilege specification" add the following text,username ALL=(ALL) ALL for the new username exactly as it is displayed for the user pi:

Select File and Save, then close Leafpad to finish. Now you've created an account and given it the ability to perform administrative tasks as sudo, which is needed for updates and new packages or applications.

Unlike Windows, Debian is traditionally updated from the terminal. To check for and install updates, you can use the following command: sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade as seen below:

Similarly, you can install supported packages through the terminal with sudo apt-get install packagename. Debian has various packages pre-installed, ranging from the web browser, Midori, to a music player as well as programming and educational applications. Popular packages are also available if you need more than the stock software. We may cover some of these programs in future guides.

As is the case with Linux in general, wireless can be a bit patchy with the Raspberry Pi. If you want to use wireless, the organization has information on its Wiki regarding USB Wi-Fi hardware. Wireless niggles aside, USB external hard disks and flash media will automatically mount when inserted in Debian and full read/write support for NTFS is also included, in case you need to access a Windows-based drive.

Considering its price, the Raspberry Pi is quite remarkable. It's obviously no powerhouse, but $35 gets you a system capable of office work, light image editing, browsing, programming, emailing and so on. The Pi's versatility makes it suitable for various dedicated roles too, such as a torrent box downloading through external USB or network drives, or as an XMBC-based HTPC, which we might cover eventually.

 
It's easy to lose track of the Pi in-between other regular-sized devices.

Although there are many obvious uses for the Raspberry Pi, the platform's open nature means your imagination is the limit. It'll be interesting to see what the community cooks up in the coming months. We'll be watching and posting our own how-to guides when time comes.