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Apple win a phyrric victory




















It strikes me as odd that the US patent office grants patents on things that are obvious. However, this should rebound on Apple. This kind of thing is a PR disaster for a start. I had an Apple computer and gave it away in the end. I could never work out where it was putting my stuff and what it was doing with it, which meant that I could not back it up. The devices themselves are difficult to repair. I stick to Lenovo for portable computing and am still on an X61 (above). A discreet, robust and functional design and main components such as the disk drive, CD reader and keyboard are easily replaced. You can get one on ebay for about £150, max out the memory, officially 4Gb but actually 8Gb, load with the latest Linux and away you go.

I never thought much of the iphone and its clones anyway. Fragile vulnerable screen. Miniature touch-screen qwerty keyboard? How stupid is that?

I hope that other manufacturers will rise to the challenge and come up with more robust devices with better ergonomics.

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