Luxurious Bentley laptop, we kid you not

In the past, we've seen laptops named after high-end sports car manufacturers, such as Ferrari and Lamborghini, but what about the luxury car enthusiast? Well, the wait is now over: Ego has announced the Bentley laptop. In keeping with the tradition of the hallowed British brand, the laptop features a hand-stitched leather lid cover and a curved metal case painted the same colors as the car. When closed, the laptop can be carried by its handle, which is also reminiscent of the door handle of the automobile.

Otherwise, you're getting a pretty standard laptop, featuring Windows Vista 64-bit and a 160GB hard drive. It costs a whopping US$20,000--but considering the cost of your average Bentley, we guess that's something of a bargain. The Bentley laptop should be available later this summer (in the UK, at least). So you still have time to take out a second mortgage on your home and be the talk of the town.

Via CNET Crave

MSI Wind gets a battery upgrade

One of our favorite new Netbook laptops is the 10-inch MSI Wind, which has decent specs and performance, but is saddled with a terrible three-cell battery--we got about 2 hours max from it. MSI blamed supply chain problems for preventing the initial run of the Wind from shipping with the more common six-cell battery found in systems like the ASUS Eee PC 901.

Now we hear that the six-cell version is on the way, already popping up for preorder in several online stores. There's a catch, though; the new battery jacks up the cost by US$50, bringing the total price to US$550, passing our magic US$499 Netbook optimal price point. ASUS also offers a 10-inch model with similar specs for US$550, the Eee PC 1000H, but both these systems have standard hard drives, not the SSD drives found in most Netbooks.

We're currently testing new Netbooks from Acer, ASUS and Sylvania, so stay tuned for a serious Netbook shootout to find which one is right for you.

Via CNET Crave

Adobe's online CS3 tutorials receive more than 5 million plays

So you got yourself some Adobe CS3 products, but you're still trying to get your workspace organized or iron out your cross-product workflow or how to use the Puppet tool in After Effects? Apparently lots of other people are in the same position according to a case study from EffectiveUI, developers of Adobe's online Video Workshop application built using Adobe Flex. The tutorials have seen more than 5 million plays over its first year.

The video tutorials cover 22 of Adobe's products including all the CS3 components and span 47 topics. The information comes from product experts across the Adobe community and the videos are produced by Lynda.com. And aside from viewing them online, a number of the tutorials can be downloaded for viewing offline.

Oh and in related news, You Suck at Photoshop is back on, fresh from a Webby win.

Via CNET Crave

Third-generation Classmate PC on its way

Intel is working on the next version of its low-cost laptop, which could be ready in the next month or so, according to a report in PC World.

There are no pictures, and very few concrete details on what changes are in store for the device, which is intended for school children. Intel would only say it will have a "new look and feel", and will get both hardware and software upgrades.

We may already have a clue as to what tweaks the software might be getting. Last month, Sugar Labs, a spinoff of rival low-cost laptop maker One Laptop Per Child (OLPC), said it will develop a version of its Sugar interface for the Classmate PC.

The version currently shipping runs Linux and just got a spec bump: It now contains a 1.6GHz Atom processor and 1GB of memory.

Though originally intended for education applications in developing nations, earlier this year Intel began making the Classmate available at retail in the US and Europe.

Via CNET Crave

Olympic organizers cut deal to censor Net access

Allowing journalists access to an uncensored Internet apparently isn't on the International Olympic Committee's list of things to do before the Beijing games begin next week.

A day after journalists learned their Internet activities would be limited, a senior IOC official admitted to Reuters on Wednesday that committee members had cut a deal to let the Chinese Government block sensitive Web sites, despite promises of unrestricted access.

"I regret that it now appears BOCOG has announced that there will be limitations on Web site access during games time," IOC press chief Kevan Gosper told Reuters, referring to Beijing's Olympic organizers. "I also now understand that some IOC officials negotiated with the Chinese that some sensitive sites would be blocked on the basis they were not considered games related."

The revelation came a day after journalists learned that organizers had backtracked on earlier guarantees that journalists would have access to an uncensored Internet at the Main Press Center and athletic venues. The announcement meant that thousands of reporters working in Beijing during the next several weeks won't have access to a multitude of sites deemed embarrassing to the Chinese government, such as Amnesty International or any sites related to the crackdown in Tibet or the banned spiritual group Falun Gong.
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