CES 2019: ASUS reverses the notch in its laptop with slimmest display bezel

Bezels aren’t just shrinking in smartphones, laptops have also started to lose them. ASUS’s latest attempt has the company reversing the notch and hiding its bottom bezel beneath the keyboard. The ZenBook S13 introduces the “world’s slimmest bezel” with a 97 percent screen-to-body ratio. ASUS achieved this by creating what can be considered a reverse notch (the webcam sticks out at the top of the screen) and hiding the bottom bezel below the keyboard when the laptop is open. On either side of the 13.9-inch 1080p display, the bezels are at 2.5mm, which means the overall footprint of this laptop is less than most 13-inch laptops.

The ZenBook S13 is powered by an 8^th-gen Intel Core i7 processor, up to 16GB of RAM, and up to 1TB of PCIe SSD storage. Impressively, ASUS was able to squeeze in NVIDIA’s GeForce MX150 GPU. These slim laptops usually rely on integrated graphics, so putting in discrete graphics is a great addition. Letting games like Fortnite can even run at the display’s native 1080p in 30fps. It comes with two USB-C ports, one USB-A port, and a microSD card reader. There’s also an integrated fingerprint sensor in the trackpad. The laptop is expected to launch in Q1, but no word on pricing just yet.

Source: The Verge

CES 2019: Google Assistant to power one billion devices

"Ok, Google, how many devices are you going to be on?"  The answer to that question is a stunning 1 billion devices by 2019. Google wasn't the first to come out with a smart assistant for consumers (that honour goes to Apple's Siri, which is sadly an also-ran in the current race).

Amazon's Echo has exploded thanks to their line of Alexa powered devices numbering 100 million, but it seems Google is set to dominate since Google Assistant is in Chromebooks, Android and iOS devices, Android Auto car infotainment, myriad smart-speakers, smart TVs, plugs, bulbs, doorknobs...you name it. 

The big difference for Google Assistant is its language support. It was the first smart assistant with full French Canadian support from the get go (no surprise there, parts of the OS and hardware were developed in Canada).  

To date, you can parlez with Google Assistant in 30 languages and in 80 countries, talk about world domination. Active Google Assistant users have grown four times over the past year and as announcements out of International CES 2019 show, Google Assistant is being bundled in all sorts of cool and weird products.

Source: Engadget

CES 2019: Acer's new Predator Triton 900 represents peak gaming notebook

Gaming notebooks are expected to be huge in 2019 and Acer has pretty much dropped the gauntlet at CES in Las Vegas with the audacious Predator Triton 900.

This is a 2-in-1 notebook built around a 4K 17-inch touch display as well as Intel’s recent hexacore 8th Gen Core i7 processors mated to Nvidia’s RTX 2080 graphics card/ Also on tap are lightning fast NVMe PCIe SSDs and up to 32GB DDR4 RAM which pushes pricing for this beast beyond its US $4,000 starting price.

Mastercard celebrates 50 years by dropping its name

Mastercard is dropping its name in select branding and becoming something more, a symbol. The company announced it is dropping its name from its iconic brand mark in select contexts. With this latest milestone in Mastercard’s rebrand, which started in 2016, the interlocking red and yellow circles will now stand on their own. 

“Reinvention in the digital age calls for modern simplicity,” said Raja Rajamannar, chief marketing and communication officer at Mastercard. “And with more than 80 percent of people spontaneously recognizing the Mastercard Symbol without the word‘mastercard,’ we felt ready to take this next step in our brand evolution. We are proud of our rich brand heritage and are excited to see the iconic circles standing on their own.”

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