Trade In and Refresh Your PC with SNS Network

Do you have any old desktop, laptop or even netbook that is still functioning? If you have one and it's Intel inside, then you can consider to trade-in your old PC and gets a brand new PC powered by Intel processor at discounts of up to RM 500.

This trade in promotion is brought to you by SNS Network. However, its official website is not yet updated with the latest information as advertised on the newspaper. The participating brands are Acer, Dell, HP, Lenovo, Samsung and Sony. You can take a look at the specification of the selected models here.

The laptop prices are very attractive with the trade in promotion, starting from RM 699. The most affordable model comes with basic spec which is good enough for daily Internet surfing. You can choose the models depend on your usage pattern for the laptop.

All the models come with Windows 8. For better user experience, I would recommend you to go for those models with touch screen. This is because Windows 8 Modern User Interface (UI) is designed with tablets in mind. However, mouse and keyboard are still working great for Windows 8 as the shortcut keys are maintained and there are new features on the cursor.

Raspberry Pi - Cheapest Home Theatre PC Solution

The Raspberry Pi is a credit card sized single-board computer developed in the UK by the Raspberry Pi Foundation. It’s a miniature ARM-based PC which can be used like a desktop PC. The Foundation's goal is to offer two versions, priced at US$ 25 and US$ 35.

The Raspberry Pi has a Broadcom BCM2835 system on a chip (SoC), which includes an ARM1176JZF-S 700 MHz processor, VideoCore IV GPU and 256MB RAM. It uses an SD card for booting and long-term storage. Raspberry Pi runs on Linux & possibly Android (someone is working on the porting). There is a Debian-based OS known as Raspbian which is optimized for this board.

You can get this board from Element14 for RM125.

Turn your LCD/LED TV into a Computer

3 years ago, I setup a desktop as a HTPC (Home Theatre PC) that was connected to my LCD TV. Then I could watch movies, view photos and surf Internet through the big screen. I still remember it cost me around RM1200 for the HTPC.

With the rapid increasing popularity of ARM processors and Android OS, now there are a few mini PCs that are as small as USB thumbdrive, namely:

• Cotton Candy by FXI, priced at USD 199
• mini PC-MK802 by Rikomagic, priced at USD76 (free shipping)

From as low as RM235, you can turn your LCD TV into a computer! This is the best solution for people who wish to add extra features to their LCD TV with minimum cost. You can even run Ubuntu Linux from it.

Let's take a look at the spec of the mini PC-MK802:

• Operating System: Android 4.0
• Processor: Allwinner A10 1.5GHz Cotex-A8
• Memory: 1GB DDR RAM
• Storage: 4GB NAND Flash (1GB used by system)
• External storage: USB and microSD of up to 32GB
• Graphics: Mali 400MP GPU
• HDMI and USB connections
• Apps included: Google Play, Google Mail, Google Maps, Youtube, Youku, PPS.TV Tablet Version, PPTV, Browser, Flash Player, QQ Messenger, Angry Bird Space and more