Acer, Ferrari unveil smartphone

Car manufacturer Ferrari and notebook specialists Acer have unveiled a new smartphone model that both companies have been working on, which is based on the Acer Liquid smartphone, says Silicon Republic.

The model, according to Reuters, will use Google Android operating software, will be Ferrari-branded and pre-loaded with content from its racing team.

In the already congested smartphone market, the version of Acer's Liquid model is being targeted at a special-interest market - with only 200 000 models in production.

Lenovo intends to bring out its own tablet offering sometime during 2011, writes Softpedia.

When Apple released the iPad, PC makers were sceptical about its chances to sell and especially about the likelihood of media slates becoming a market in their own right, says the report. Still, a few months later, iPad sales confirmed that slates were here to stay, so companies began to put together their own models.

Lenovo is among those that plan to grab a slice of this dawning segment as early as possible, which is why it has been working on the LePad.

In-flight testing of the second-gen MacBook Air has shown that Apple's notebook may have what it takes to be a superb business laptop for frequent travellers, states Australian Business Traveller.

Australian Business Traveller took the new 13-inch MacBook Air on a domestic trip, including lugging through an airport, Qantas Club, inflight and several days' solid use on the road.

According to the test report, Apple has corrected the biggest deficiencies of the first-gen model; the single USB port in an inconvenient flip-down tray has been replaced by two standard ports; the extremely slow hard drive has been replaced by high speed SSD flash memory in sizes up to 256GB and the screen resolution is now equivalent to a MacBook Pro.