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Following Nokia's high-profile acquisition of Navteq last month, it's not surprising that the world's largest phone maker is using SEMA 2007 for the debut of its N500 portable navigation device. The N500 boasts a 4.3-inch color touch-screen display and a built-in speaker for giving turn-by-turn voice guidance; the system also features text-to-speech technology for reading out the names of individual streets. An integrated FM transmitter allows drivers to stream spoken directions via their car speakers. Being a Nokia device, the N500 naturally comes with cell phone compatibility and can be used as a hands-free Bluetooth calling device. It will be available in the first quarter of 2008 with a retail price of around $500, excluding tax.
Anonymous sources at notebook makers maintain Intel is still on track to launch new dual-core Atom-based CPUs with DDR3 RAM support, according to sources from notebook players, Digitimes reported on Monday. Two such chips, the Atom N455 and N475, are due very soon, though no specific dates have been mentioned. This June, Intel will out more details about its third-generation netbook platform.This is also when the chipmaker will launch dual-core Atom N500-series chips, the sources say. ASUS will likely be the first to launch an Atom N500-based netbook, with plans to ship it this summer for the equivalent of about $575.
Will the N500 support DDR3 RAM? If it's a re-branded D510 (which has basically no performance gain over the old 330), I kind of doubt it, but I hope so.My thinking is that if you take the N500 and team it up with Ion 2 (w/ optimus), DDR3, 1366x768 and swap the drive for SSD, you could probably get the machine performing about as well as the Alienware m11x for a couple hundred bucks less. If you can't hit that kind of performance, you might as well buy the m11x or a real notebook. Today's netbooks are plenty adequate if all you want to do is check email and surf a bit, and a lot cheaper than $575.
Everything worked flawlessly out of the box for me, running ubuntu 9.04 on the 3000 n500. Even wireless works extremely well (with intel wireless driver), much better than under vista where I had problems. Fn buttons and trackpad work too, and the CPU which used to whine under vista is silent in ubuntu. In'm extremely satisfied!
N500 Images
