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PC World's 20 Most Innovative Products of 2006 233

Posted by samzenpus from the top-20-list dept.
Craig Sender writes "PC World has put together a list of their choices for the 20 Most Innovative Products of 2006. The List includes Office 2007, Nintendo Wii, Sony Reader, Sony PlayStation 3, the BlackBerry Pearl, and some other interesting choices."
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PC World's 20 Most Innovative Products of 2006 More

PC World's 20 Most Innovative Products of 2006

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  • Print view (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 27, 2006 @11:12PM (#17383878)
    http://www.pcworld.com/printable/article/id,128176 /printable.html [pcworld.com]

    Ridiculous that the article is stretched across 8 pages.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by AZScotsman ( 962881 )
      Gotta make room for all those ads somehow.... I stopped paying attention to PC World and PC Week over 8 years ago. It's pretty clear that their "reviews" have lapsed into the Puff-Piece Zone, and the rating they give software/hardware is relative to the number of full-page ads the subject has bought over the last twelve issues. Years ago, I wrote for a "subscription-only" print mag that reviewed game software and published hints and walkthrus (Yeah, it was a cushy job, but somebody had to do it...). We di

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by curtisk ( 191737 )
      Ridiculous that the article is stretched across 8 pages.

      Thanks for the alternate view linkage, it would hurt even more if I had to read that spotty list clicking "next" over and over

      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward
        Why did you feel the need to add 'age' to the word 'link'?

        Are you also one of those nutters who asks: "Got any coinage?"

        WHAT IS WRONG WITH COINS! WHAT!

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by vought ( 160908 )
        Thanks for the alternate view linkage, it would hurt even more if I had to read that spotty list clicking "next" over and over

        And on PC World's site, the article's "next" and "back" links are nearly pixel for pixel copies of....Safari's back and forward buttons.

        Even PC World's web site is aping the Mac OS now!

  • gah (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Red Flayer ( 890720 ) on Wednesday December 27, 2006 @11:14PM (#17383888) Journal
    Can this article please be re-labeled as an advertorial?

    I'd like to see advertising revenue figures from 2006 for the featured items' companies on PCWorlds financials... I wonder how closely they'd tie in to the rank of the products.

    I'm sure it's part of their sales strategy (I work in print publishing... you can bet advertisers get preferential treatment in editorial content).

    • Here are the top 10. (Score:5, Informative)

      by khasim ( 1285 ) <brandioch.conner@gmail.com> on Wednesday December 27, 2006 @11:23PM (#17383944)
      1. Microsoft Office 2007
      2. Intel Core 2 Duo
      3. Parallels Desktop for Mac
      4. Nintendo Wii
      5. Samsung 32GB SSD
      6. Sony Reader
      7. YouOS
      8. Dell XPS M2010
      9. Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 750GB
      0. T-Mobile Dash

      • Re:Here are the top 10. (Score:5, Insightful)

        by seebs ( 15766 ) on Thursday December 28, 2006 @12:06AM (#17384152) Homepage
        Innovative?

        Core 2 Duo: How is this anything but an incremental improvement over the Core Duo, which is in turn just improvements on techniques that have been out there for years? The first dual-core chip could have been innovative. The 39th or whatever this is isn't.

        MS Office 2007: I see. So, Office 6, Office 97, Office XP, Office 2003, none of those were innovative. But this one, the 10th or so in a series, really is. ...

        I just don't see any innovation here. A hard drive bigger than previous hard drives? Unheard of!

        • Re:Here are the top 10. (Score:4, Funny)

          by stubear ( 130454 ) on Thursday December 28, 2006 @12:10AM (#17384184)
          Well then you're fucking blind. Office 2007 is innovative because it rethinks the toolbar interface. The ribbon is a great UI concept and exposes hidden functionality in the older versions of Office.

          • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

            by seebs ( 15766 )
            Maybe it's neat. Is it one of the ten most innovative things done in an entire year?

            I mean, every time there's a new Office, various MS-fans tell me that it's completely innovative and, unlike the previous one, doesn't suck. Why should I believe it this time?

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Rockgod ( 962796 )
              Nobody is forcing you to believe anything on hear-say. Why don't just try it out and add some weight to your Office bashing?

              P.S: Please don't tell you're sick of already trying out the all the previous versions and why should this version of Office be better. It just may be.

              • Re: (Score:2, Troll)

                by seebs ( 15766 )
                If you'll buy it for me, I'll try it.

                I'm not about to spend $hundreds on the off chance that, for the first time since 1987, I'm going to find that MS Word has suddenly become a good tool for writing with.

                • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

                  by masdog ( 794316 )
                  The good news is that its free to try for 60 days.

                  • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

                    by smoker2 ( 750216 )
                    The good news is that its free to try for 60 days.
                    The good news is that it's free to try and crack for 60 days.

                    There, fixed that for you !

            • Just means the year really sucked for innovation.

      • Re Bleh (Score:3, Funny)

        by value_added ( 719364 )
        The one that impressed me most was seeing a mention of sed TV. I haven't read the article yet (too long), but now I'm all pins and needles.

        Just think, right around the corner we might see awk Radio! Or Perl the Movie. Or how about groff the Board Game?

    • In 2005 they ranked firefox and gmail the #1 and #2 best products of the year. Neither of those two advertises with PC World. (to my knowledge, correct me if I am wrong)

      Could it be that MS Office (#1 on this list) just isnt popular with the slashdot crowd and that is why the first several posts are denouncing PC World as paid Microsoft shills?

      • Could be. (Score:5, Insightful)

        by khasim ( 1285 ) <brandioch.conner@gmail.com> on Wednesday December 27, 2006 @11:35PM (#17384006)
        Could it be that MS Office (#1 on this list) just isnt popular with the slashdot crowd and that is why the first several posts are denouncing PC World as paid Microsoft shills?

        It could be.

        But then ..... look at #8
        8. Dell XPS M2010

        Sporting a cutting-edge design, the Dell XPS M2010 (starting price $2999) makes a bold and immediate statement. Not quite a desktop and definitely less portable than a standard notebook, this hybrid system neatly balances elements of both. You get a 20.1-inch screen, a slot-loading DVD drive, and a detachable, full-size Bluetooth keyboard, plus an integrated Webcam, eight built-in speakers, and a subwoofer. Powering this entertainment system are ATI graphics, an Intel Core 2 Duo CPU, and up to 4GB of RAM. It also folds up into a briefcase-like bundle, complete with a handle--but it weighs a hefty 18-plus pounds.

        Now, compare that to this system.
        http://www.obsoletecomputermuseum.org/compaq/ [obsoleteco...museum.org]

        Yes, the "luggable" computer. But, all you have to do to make it "innovative" is to add more speakers (speakers with a portable computer, how ... innovative) and a bigger screen (see previous).

        And reviews like that are why PC World is disparaged.
        • I think there is a fair bit of difference between those two things. The dell looks like a product specifically designed for LAN gamer types in mind and improves a great deal on the ease of lugging it around compared to what existed before. It looks to me more like a desktop designed to be easy to move around than a traditional laptop. The computer you linked to looks more like an ancient precurser to the laptop than a gamers system that is easy to move around.

          I guess you can make the case that a luggable

          • I think there is a fair bit of difference between those two things.

            Yes. About 22 years worth of "difference". Seeing as how I believe that the Compaq luggable was around in 1984.

            It looks to me more like a desktop designed to be easy to move around than a traditional laptop.

            Yes. Hence the term "luggable".

            The computer you linked to looks more like an ancient precurser to the laptop than a gamers system that is easy to move around.

            "gamers system"?

            I guess you can make the case that a luggable computer you could

          • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

            by Anonymous Coward
            The number one reason this wouldn't be a LAN gamers system is the big Dell logos on it.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Rakishi ( 759894 )
            It's also hardly innovative by any measure, there have been various home made luggable modern computers usually using a suitcase of some sort (with monitors at times). I'm sure some of them came very close to the Dell in idea if with less polish or style. All Dell did was take what those people attempted to do and put actual money into it, and that's marketing not innovation.

            You mentioned the ipod in another comment which wasn't, if one considers it as such, innovative because it was an mp3.portable player
      • Could it be that MS Office (#1 on this list) just isnt popular with the slashdot crowd and that is why the first several posts are denouncing PC World as paid Microsoft shills?
        No, for me it weas the gushing reviews of products (with links to their sales sites) that just didn't seem to be anything more than gloss ads. Nothing at all to do with Microsoft in particular.
        • I dont see any links to sales sites on there. Am I just missing some obvious bit of text? The only ones I can see go to pictures and reviews. Maybe when you were there you got served an ad that was based on the context of what you were viewing, but that would have happened regardless of whether the blurb was favorable or not.

          Its not unusual for top X lists to sound like a little like ads, I mean obviously they liked the product so it seems logical that the little blurb would be favorable. They have list

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by masdog ( 794316 )
        Seeing as how Office 2007 isn't technically out yet (at least I can't go to Best Buy/Fry's/CompUSA/NewEgg/etc and purchase a copy), it strikes me as astroturfing.

        Both Firefox and GMail were hard to ignore. They took the world by storm and forced Microsoft (and in GMail's case, just about every other webmail provider) to improve their product.
        • Its been released to business customers, and it currently has an install base larger than almost every other software software product sold from those stores you mentioned. It is very much "out". I think a good analogy would be movies that open in a couple of theatres and then see nationwide releases a week or so later. The movie is still said to have been released the day it started playing, not the day that it started playing nationwide.

          My point with firefox and gmail is not that they werent important

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by sanyam_y ( 982945 )
      Intel/Microsoft != Innovation. Their products might be the most successful in the year, but certainly not innovative.

  • Proving once again that PC World has no shame (Score:4, Insightful)

    by loftwyr ( 36717 ) on Wednesday December 27, 2006 @11:15PM (#17383898)
    PC World brings you the top 20 most frequent advertisers' current most hyped object!

    But wait! There wasn't an iPod! But iPods are the most innovative things evar!

    Number 0 must be the iPod Video, now with rubber ducky control built in!

    • Re:Proving once again that PC World has no shame (Score:5, Insightful)

      by HappySqurriel ( 1010623 ) on Thursday December 28, 2006 @12:16AM (#17384212)
      Well, I went looking for a definition of Innovate and what I got was:

      To begin or introduce (something new) for or as if for the first time.

      What bothers me with this list is that most of the products can not really be classified as inovative; the list might be alright if it was the 10 most important products released in 2006, or the 10 most improved product lines of 2006, but 10 most innovative is a big stretch. Now, I recognize that this is partially my love of the Wii speaking but the Wii is (from my understanding) the only product on that list which really brings anything new; the others may bring a lot of improvement to their product lines, but they don't bring much that is really new.

  • Annoying article.. (Score:2, Redundant)

    by euxneks ( 516538 )
    Is anyone else annoyed at the amount of ads you have to see not just once, but _every_ time you have to view the "next" part of the webpage? This is the internet fer god's sake! Put all the content on one page or you're not getting my possible viewing revenue!

  • Playstation 3? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Lethyos ( 408045 ) on Wednesday December 27, 2006 @11:18PM (#17383926) Journal

    Can someone explain to me exactly what is innovative about this? I do not understand how a hardware upgrade is innovative. Can I get on this list since I put a new video card in my machine this year?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by interiot ( 50685 )
      It has lots of features (like the 3DO had), but it's a great deal? (if you're in the market for a Blu-ray player...) Although the motion control was tacked on in response to the Wii, and the networking support was a not-spectacular attempt at matching the 360's, a few of the subsystems are thought to be better than its peers?
    • It's got a cell processor [wikipedia.org], and it's a video game system. Do you think that there are a lot of other video game systems with a processor that complicated? For that matter, there aren't a lot of general purpose computers with that kind of power.

      While I really hope that it isn't successful (mostly because I want the video game designers driving the video game industry, not the hardware designers), I can't argue that it's a new kind of thing.

      Unlike nearly everything else on that list.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by node 3 ( 115640 )
      The Cell processor, the Blu-ray drive, the bluetooth controllers are all innovations.

      You may not like them, you may hate Sony, but it's absolutely seeping with innovative technologies. It's really a next-gen console, not a last-gen.5.

      Xbox 360 has no innovation whatsoever, it's just a faster Xbox with nicer software. The Wii has an innovative controller, and a cool virtual console service. It's certainly not a gaming powerhouse nor an HD superstar.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Crizp ( 216129 )
        Using a Blu-Ray drive is not innovation, it was the logical next step in console optical storage that next-gen consoles would use one of the new disc formats; that Sony chose Blu-Ray is no surprise.

        The Wii is innovative, in introducing a new way of controlling and playing the games. Without getting into a console flamewar, the PS3 and 360 are, technically and factually just GFX upgrade bonanza. Nintendo changed little about the GameCube design, one can almost say the just added the new controller. That tiny

  • YouOS (Score:5, Insightful)

    by daigu ( 111684 ) on Wednesday December 27, 2006 @11:19PM (#17383928) Journal
    Anything in alpha testing can't really be called a product, much less the most innovative product (or in the top ten) of the year.
    • Anything in alpha testing can't really be called a product, much less the most innovative product (or in the top ten) of the year.

      Have you seen the whole list? I'd say that YouOS has far more rights to be on this list than any other item.

      I agree that there is hardly any use for it right now, but this is like a concept car: nobody uses them as they are, but you see many innovative parts of it appear in other new cars in a while.

  • Google Sketchup? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I'm surprised this made the "Innovative" list, and not the "Vaporware" list.

    Since Google bought them, all they've done to the actual app is stamp "BETA" on it. They brag that it works on Macs, but the last upgrade was over 18 months ago, before Apple announced the Intel transition, and they still have no Universal binary for Macs. The PPC binary works, mostly, if you're willing to put up with workarounds. Oh, and random crashes.

    It's a sad state of affairs when "making no forward progress" counts as "inno
    • I'm surprised this made the "Innovative" list, and not the "Vaporware" list.

      Integrating Sketchup with Google Earth has opened up a lot of interesting opportunities. As a stand-alone tool, it was a useful, if quirky, CAD package. Now, it's potential as a way of rapidly (by way of community involvement) building 3D versions of our cities and suburbs goes far beyond its original scope.

      That's a lot more innovative than a facelift to an aging set of office tools, which rely more on format lockin than innovat

  • A Hard Drive? (Score:2, Redundant)

    by acvh ( 120205 )
    wow, a new hard drive that's bigger than last year's model. Innovation is dripping off of this one.

    I assume others will speak to the inclusion of Office.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by RealGrouchy ( 943109 )

      I assume others will speak to the inclusion of Office.

      Not as many as I would expect by now.

      My initial thought was also "MS OFFICE?!? INNOVATIVE?!?" (see username...).

      Personally, I would define "innovative" in this context as "things customers probably wouldn't have thought of, but once they saw it, they liked," and limit it to those products/changes that were introduced in 2006.

      When I actually RTFA, MSO 2k7 is actually fairly innovative, in comparison to most of the rest on the list.

      Skimming over the list

    • I believe that the 750 gig drives were considered innovative because the 750 gig drive were the first to 'get perpendicular' [hitachigst.com].

  • These guys are confused. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 27, 2006 @11:34PM (#17384000)
    Even if PC World is too clueless to realise it, there is a difference between "innovative" and "better than the same thing was last year, due to incremental advances". Core 2 Duo: Good? Hell yeah. Innovative? Not exactly.

    750GB HDD: A nice upgrade from the 500GB ones? Sure. An innovation? Well, the number is bigger than it was last year.

    That logitech control puck thing: Cute? Sure. Innovative? Well, it has a few more buttons than the Griffin PowerMate that has been around for years.

    And so on and so forth. There are almost no actual innovations. Mostly just feature bumps and price/performance increases. Now, that is what makes the world go round, most of the time; but don't call it "innovation".
    • From this article, I conclude the computer and electronic revolution has run it's course. We are not getting much innovation anymore. We are just getting incremental improvements on the innovations from years past.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by masdog ( 794316 )
      I'm not an engineer, so I don't know what goes into designing a hard drive, especially one that large, but I'm guessing there is something new or interesting that makes people think it is innovative besides just being larger.

      Another poster mentioned perpendicular recording...so perhaps that is what makes it innovative.

  • WOOOOOOO (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Diordna ( 815458 )
    A bad upgrade to a ubiquitous software package, a chip, 2 game systems, 2 hard drives, 2 phones... Now I remember why I don't read PC World.

  • Is it me, or... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by mind21_98 ( 18647 ) on Wednesday December 27, 2006 @11:40PM (#17384040) Homepage Journal
    ...do none of those products really strike me as "innovative"? Maybe I'm just missing the old days when innovation meant a complete change from the norm. However, the Wii is pretty neat. :)

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by crossmr ( 957846 )
      The Wii is probably the only innovative thing on there, they could have been more specific though and talked just about the controllers.

  • How many laptops did it take? (Score:5, Funny)

    by atari2600 ( 545988 ) on Wednesday December 27, 2006 @11:41PM (#17384044)
    So for MS Office 2k7 to make the number one position, i wonder how many LAPTOPS [slashdot.org] Microsoft had to give away. Just kidding, just kidding - i couldn't resist.

  • Please perfect the innovations we already have. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by gelfling ( 6534 ) on Thursday December 28, 2006 @12:00AM (#17384122) Homepage Journal
    Frankly I'm disappointed that the gadgets we already have really don't work so hot. Like Cell Phones. Why can't I get usable USB or Bluetooth drivers and sync software for my Samsung A640, even from Samsung? Oh yeah I forgot, Sprint wants me to pay for a service to email them to myself. Ditto my Sanyo 3100, Samsung A840, Samsung A900 or Sanyo 8400?

    Why does my Xbox360 still require bizarre router settings to connect wirelessly to my router? Oh yeah I forgot, Microsoft does not care. Why did I have to return 3 different routers until I found one that worked with all my clients and VPN tunnels? Oh yeah I forgot, they're lazy. Why did the wireless print server I picked up naturally assume that it had to have the same IP address as my router and afforded absolutely no options to switch it? Oh yeah I forgot, the vendor bought the product instead of developing themselves. Plus the quality of their firmware is shit. Why am I still shopping for an affordable NAS that actually does what it's supposed to do without bugs and the feature set is actually what they say it is instead of vague promises and bullshit? Oh yeah I forgot, all the goodness is in the next version of their $700 unit. Sorry.

    See I'm not a big fan of best new gadgets because next year either they will be abandoned as the shit they probably are, or, they will be shit anyway and still be around bolstered by hype, consumer indifference and marketing.

    • Why am I still shopping for an affordable NAS that actually does what it's supposed to do without bugs and the feature set is actually what they say it is instead of vague promises and bullshit? Oh yeah I forgot, all the goodness is in the next version of their $700 unit.

      Which unit are you talking about, out of curiosity? I've been eying the ReadyNAS NV+ and the Thecus N5200.

      I've seen benchmarks showing performance is all over the map with the ReadyNAS, and I know that it painfully slow with fsck's (a

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by gelfling ( 6534 )
        Synology 106j or e units. They all have haphazard feature sets and do some things well and others poorly. Also after you figure out how to get most of the features running you discover that the onboard fan is so poor that you're bound to burn out your brand new SATA drive. You have to go all the way up to the 406 series to find a complete set of features that work plus environmentals that function. Which puts me where you alluded - to just building my own inside a PC. Ergo it's no longer quiet, compact or u

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by masdog ( 794316 )
        You can probably build a FreeNAS box for cheaper if cost is more important than performance.
    • I bought a 360 wireless adapter the other day, for using it on a friends unprotected wireless network. I plugged it in via usb, attached it to the unit and powered it on. I was immediately connected and playing CoD3 before I knew it. Didn't even have to go to the dashboard...

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ceeam ( 39911 )
      Because "It does indeed work as advertised" is not on any of product feature checklists. Maybe it should be.

  • Parallels? (Score:3, Funny)

    by WMD_88 ( 843388 ) <kjwolff8891@yahoo.com> on Thursday December 28, 2006 @12:15AM (#17384208) Homepage Journal
    Why is Parallels Desktop on there? I've seen it - it's almost a complete rip-off of the VMware UI. There is nothing new in that program at all...except that it runs on Intel Macs. Oh boy!

  • think before (Score:2, Insightful)

    by towsonu2003 ( 928663 )
    accepting a submission. maybe then, you can see that it's full of crap (i.e. it has much more advertisement than quality content).

  • Olympus E-330 like the Panasonic DMC-L1 (Score:3, Informative)

    by kherr ( 602366 ) <kevin&puppethead,com> on Thursday December 28, 2006 @12:24AM (#17384256) Homepage
    While the features of the Olympus E-330 are new for a digital SLR (live view and electronic dust cleaner) , Panasonic's DMC-L1 has the same features described as #14 most innovative product. This isn't surprising at all, since Panasonic and Olympus share technology, including the Four Thirds lens mount. In fact, it would have been better to list Four Thirds instead of a specific camera, since it's a cross-platform lens system specifically for digital cameras.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by masdog ( 794316 )
      And the Panasonic/Olympus cameras aren't the only ones with self-cleaning sensors - the Canon Rebel XTi also has it.

  • Big flash drives (Score:4, Insightful)

    by NineNine ( 235196 ) on Thursday December 28, 2006 @12:25AM (#17384262)
    This is gonna be the next big thing in all kinds of PC's. Flash drives. We'll be able to say bye-bye to the last of the important moving parts in a PC, that happens to be the most defect prone (because of moving parts), and also the most important (assuming your data is worth more than your hardware). I've been wanting these for years for reliability reasons at work. I can't wait until these things get shoved in a vanilla IDE (or is it SATA these days?) format. Hard drives with platters will be completely extinct in 5 years.
  • I felt a disturbance in the Slash, as if a bunch of geeks said, "What the F&*K, Microsoft Office?"
  • I fail to see how the PS3 can be considered innovative by any means. All of the technologies that go into the PS3 have all been seen before and it is not at all as impressive or original that they packed it all into 1 box as the article would lead you to believe. How is a PS3 anything but a single purpose computer?
    It is no more impressive or innovative than adding an FM tuner to a portable MP3 player.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by seebs ( 15766 )
      The cell is pretty innovative, I'd say. It's a substantial rethink of a number of assumptions about processor design.

      Using an experimental research processor in a mass-market toy? That's innovative. :)
  • Ironic that I have to hit next fifty bazillion times to see the whole article, and each time I hit next an ad for Sony/Dell/Intel/Microsoft. I got the Sony add a lot too, but then again I see forty bazillion sony products on this list, none of which match the definition of innovative. Well, maybe the marketer's definition of innovative, but not in the real world.

  • Where is the "innovation"? (Score:5, Informative)

    by Helldesk Hound ( 981604 ) on Thursday December 28, 2006 @01:37AM (#17384638) Homepage
    Lets look at this list...

    1. Microsoft Office 2007
    Nothing innovative here - GUI office productivity suites have been around for decades - MS Word was the innovation on the Apple MacIntosh - but that was before MS released a usable version of MS Windows!

    2. Intel Core 2 Duo
    Where is the innovation here? The Intel Core 2 Duo is merely two CPUs on a single chip. Duo is neither the first 64bit processor, nor does it share resources between cores, nor does it have an onboard RAM controller. for all the above look to AMD's CPUs.

    3. Parallels Desktop for Mac
    Running Windows software on the Mac is not a new thing - especially now that the Mac is being sold using Intel hardware. Neither is using virtualisation software to run Windows on other platforms. For years it has been possible to run Windows on Big Blue's mainframes, and on *nix using such applications as VMware.

    4. Nintendo Wii
    Truly innovative interface - completely new design for use in a completely new way with a completely different range of games.

    5. Samsung 32GB SSD
    Using Flash EPROM for mobile storage of user data is not new. Neither is the incrementing of the maximum size available. What is new is the replacement of a mechanical permanent storage device with a solid state storage device that may yet prove to be not yet as reliable as a HDD.

    6. Sony Reader
    Truly innovative device that enables electronic texts to be read as easily and as casually if they were a proper book, and with a very easy UI. Only problem is that it uses a proprietary file format.

    7. YouOS
    Using a browser for remote desktop access is not a new development.

    8. Dell XPS M2010
    Portable computers have been around for decades (predating even the Mac). Wireless keyboards are not new, nor is a DVD player, nor is a 20" flat screen. Nothing new there - except the hefty weight.

    9. Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 750GB
    Yes - innovative method of writing data onto a HDD. But the fact of increased storage capacity is nothing new. HDDs have been increasing storage capacity for many decades.

    10. T-Mobile Dash
    QWERTY keyboard not new. 1.3 megapixel camera - not new. Wireless - not new.
    Additional RAM storage - not new (but close). Amount of built in RAM - definitely not innovative.

    11. Pioneer Inno
    In one form or another a "Real Live radio receiver" that can also record onto some sort of storage medium has been around since the '70s.

    13. Sony BWU-100A Blu-Ray Disc Rewritable Drive
    Re-writeable optical discs - nothing new here.

    14. Olympus EVolt E-330
    Digital camera with LCD display - definitely nothing new here.

    15. Google SketchUp
    3D software is not new. Free (as in Libre or as in Beer) is also not new. Perhaps the ease of use is what is new.

    16. Sony PlayStation 3
    Games consoles have been around since the '70s.

    17. RIM BlackBerry Pearl 8100
    Two words... Palm Treo. Enough said.

    18. Rhapsody 4.0
    One word... Ipod.

    19. Logitech NuLooq
    Different. Cross between a joystick and a mouse and a rollerball. I wouldn't mind trying it out if I ever came across one in a shop.

    20. Shure E500PTH Sound Isolating Earphones
    Noice cancelling headsets have been around for years. Nothing new there.

    So where is the true innovation? 19, 15, 9, 6, 4. That's only 5 out of 20.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by chromozone ( 847904 )
      "2. Intel Core 2 Duo Where is the innovation here? The Intel Core 2 Duo is merely two CPUs on a single chip. Duo is neither the first 64bit processor, nor does it share resources between cores, nor does it have an onboard RAM controller. for all the above look to AMD's CPUs." Well, the cheap C2D did rout AMD's 4X more expensibve heavyweight by a 3rd on just about every meaningful index. It did so at lower energy consumption. That's a lot of innovation (except to the AMD fans who just can't admit it)

  • YouOS (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Kranfer ( 620510 ) on Thursday December 28, 2006 @03:37AM (#17385188) Homepage Journal
    Personally, I think the best innovation of 2006 was the YouOS. I started using this thing and I think it is probably the best way to share files between computers than anything else I know of besides VNC, terminal services etc... Its definately the most innovative thing I have seen all year.

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